Triggers
by madame.alexandra
Summary: Shortly after Leia takes over as Chief of State, an attempt is made on her life. The incident, over in the blink of an eye, lingers in unexpected ways, and old ghosts haunt faded scars. H/L. Identity 'verse.
1. The Attempt

_._

* * *

The Attempt

* * *

The sudden noise was out of place.

Unexpected.

_Triggering. _

The second noise followed it so immediately that it was psychological whiplash, confusing her ability to process the scene.

She had taken a pause, allowing the last few sentences she'd spoken to resonate with the audience, and in that pause, there was a deadly whistling, a _crack-_s_nap_, brutal fiery popping noise that was high-pitched and terrible all at once; immediately upon hearing the sound, her senses flared. She flinched, she inhaled, unsure if she was truly smelling burning carbon, or if the memory of it was just that strong, and one of her hands flew to her waist, where once-upon-a-time she had worn a blaster antithetical to the culture she'd been raised in.

Had she imagined it?

Time slowed around her. Her ears rang. Slowly, ever so slowly, or so she thought, she blinked, but she failed to visually process the scene around her. Perhaps because it was happening simultaneously lightening fast, and excruciatingly slow. She had the brief, fleeting thought - _was that a blaster bolt? was it two?_ \- and she had no time to answer her own confusion, to turn her head and use her senses to evaluate the moment, because one moment she was standing, her eyes gliding boldly over the crowd before her, and the next she was flat on the surface she'd been standing on, shoved so unceremoniously to the floor, nearly crushed beneath a responding body, that she lost her breath.

Finding herself suddenly trapped, she fought the immediate urge to begin screaming. Her unshakable, dreadful fear of being held down resurfaced like it hadn't in years, and she tried to jerk away on instinct, her heart pounding. Just as swiftly, she reached inside herself and grasped the Force with a practiced, intangible hand, drawing it around herself to cloak her mind in serenity and strength, forcing her senses into compliance.

_That _was_ a blaster bolt, _she thought firmly. _No; it was two. _

The smell filled her nostrils. The sound rang in her ears. She tried to figure out if she was hurt, but all she could think about was the fact that she was being held down.

A blaster bolt - two; someone had fired twice. At her?

She coughed, and fought the rising panic in her, trying to order the person to get off of her, despite having some awareness now, that it was for her own protection. She was on the verge of regaining her voice when all at once, she became utterly aware of the familiar scent surrounding her, and the weight let up a little.

"Han?" she breathed, more in confusion than anything else.

Han, _Han_ was on top of her?

Her hands scraped at him, pushing and holding all at once, as she clung to the Force, letting it soothe her, make her more and more aware of her surroundings. The cacophony around her was rising; screams, outraged shouts, gasps of shock - general melee, she realized, and she dug her nails desperately into her husband's shirt - he had been sitting in the front row for her speech, the front row on the end, slouching in his seat with a charming grin on his face. He always attended her big events, and he always reminded people he was no nobleman. He was a good husband and an even better father, but he wasn't an aristocrat, and he didn't want anyone to ever forget it.

Had _he_ tackled her? Why? _Was he hurt?_

Leia drew in a deep breath and drew one of her knees up, trying to struggle free, trying to orient her vision. Shadows cast over her, and she knew she was surrounded. Was there still a threat? She heard him groan softly and suck in his breath, and she realized, appalled, that she'd shoved her knee directly into his groin. He was sprawled over her like a shield, his knees on either side of her, chest bearing down on her head.

"Let me up," she said, turning her head up sharply, her lips moving against his neck. "Han, let me up. _Please._ Get off of me."

He relaxed enough that she didn't feel so trapped, and he rose up a little, but he did not stop covering her. He reached out to touch her face and she blinked wildly, staring at him as his face came into focus. His eyes were so full of fear - his pupils so dilated that his eyes were nearly black. The muscles in his neck stood out, his jaw was tight, and the pallor of his skin was worse than she'd seen it since - since _Tatooine,_ perhaps.

How had he gotten on the stage so quickly? Yes, he'd been sitting in the front row, but if she thought about it - there were mere seconds, _seconds,_ between the shots she'd heard, and his body covering hers.

She shifted her legs, and Han immediately shifted his hips, an act of self-preservation he did on instinct. She felt an absurd urge to laugh - what did this look like, the Chief of State, flat on her back on stage, her husband straddling her? Fully clothed or not, it had to look comical, or salacious, or _both,_ and it was probably a fair symptom of shock for her to feel unreasonably giddy for a moment.

The venue was pandemonium. Above her, beyond Han's head, Leia could see the sky, glittering with afternoon sunlight. An open air venue. An outdoor speech.

There seemed to be a good bit of swearing going on about her, but the screaming appeared to have died down.

"Is she alright?"

That was Carlist, his tone haggard, anxious, and angry.

"General Solo, the threat is neutralized."

That was the cool, professional tone of Lausta, head of Leia's security. She had done the job for years, from a time when Leia was merely a high-level ambassador, throughout her tenure as Vice Chief, and of course, now, when Leia served as Chief of State.

Han didn't move. Leia raised her eyes to his. She shook her head just slightly. She wasn't hurt. That, she was sure of. _Was he_?

Swallowing hard, Han turned his head slightly. She blinked, squinting her eyes as sun streamed over her face.

"Where's the body?" Han growled dangerously.

How many seconds, minutes, had passed? Leia sat up boldly, shoving against Han. He sat back, but caught her. His hands shook, and she wondered if he held onto her for her own protection, or to reassure himself that she was there, that she was unharmed. The security officers who surrounded them, posted in a tight circle on stage, all had weapons drawn.

"The assassin is _dead_, Han. I saw the body."

That was Tavska.

_Assassin._

An unsuccessful one, at that. Leia's thoughts were grim, and shocked. There were always credible threats against her, but had one really almost come to fruition? Sharply, she realized that if the threat was no more, then the second shot she'd heard, in such quick succession, was Lausta - or one of the others - responding to the attack. Damn efficient; _damn_ good of them.

A sharp, panicked feeling rolled down her spine and she winched, touching her fingertips to her head. Yes, quite a bit of stress and turmoil was emanating off of Han, and her as well; it was unsurprising that the children picked up on it. At home, Max was sobbing, overwhelmed by emotions he didn't understand. Noura whimpered and sucked her thumb, like she did when she was nervous, and Jaina was upset, too, probably spitting teeth at Yorev and Gareth. Swiftly, Leia locked away her emotions, instead radiating calm towards them to ease their distress.

_Don't let them have been watching,_ she thought desperately,_ please._

Jaina so liked to see Mommy on the Holo.

She let Han help her up, her teeth grinding together hard. Anger, and determination, filled her, crystallizing in her blood like ice, like steel. How long had it been since she had heard the crack of a blaster bolt, since she had faced the prospect of death? She wasn't used to it. She hadn't...she hadn't looked potential death in the eyes since she had much, much less to lose.

Lausta took one of her arms, and Han had the other. Their grips, and their faces, suggested she would immediately be escorted out, and her eyes flickered to the Holofilm that held her neatly outlined speech notes. She set her jaw. When she rose, and the crowd saw her, disheveled, wrinkled, but evidently unharmed, she heard a collective sigh, and one shout of relief. Carlist stepped up to block her from the crowd's view. He met her eyes, and the wrinkles etched into his kind face seemed so old and tired, so deeply offended.

She wondered how close the bolt had come.

"This way, Madam Chief," Lausta said firmly.

Leia took two steps, and then stopped, removing her arm from the officer's grip. Lausta stared at the place where it had been in surprise. Clearly, she expected no resistance; in most circumstances, if Lausta and her colleagues had wanted to spirit Leia away, she'd have had no chance of eluding them.

She turned her head. The crowd before her, once calm and sedate, settled in their chairs to listen, was now filled with beings on their feet. Necks craned, eyes wide, hands clasped at their faces or their chests, watching. Waiting. A wide berth marked a spot near the back where Leia deduced the body of the assassin must lay; it was a testament to Lausta's skill that only one returning shot had been fired, and no bystander had been wounded. Leia fixed her eyes on the spot for a moment, and held her hands out, gesturing the small gathering away from her.

"I am not going in," she said curtly.

Lausta, for once, seemed baffled. She stared at Leia, her jaw open. Carlist folded his arms, skeptical. Han, of course, seized her elbow. His lips drew back in a snarl and he leaned down, expressing aggression that he rarely - if ever - directed at her. His touch was not rough, but his eyes were hard, his words iron.

"_The hell you aren't_," he growled.

She looked back at him with calm understanding. She knew his fear. She could feel it pulsing through him, seeping out through is palm into her skin and radiating through her. But fear was the last thing on her mind. It had struck her, and just as coolly, she'd locked it away; she was good at that. Her tenure in Mon Mothma's position was still relatively fresh and she would not, _she would not_ have it characterized by this moment, not if this moment ended in her fleeing in terror to hide.

Instead of answering Han, she looked at Lausta coolly.

"You are certain the threat is neutralized?" she asked.

Lausta shut her mouth, and then put a hand to her heart.

"I killed the known assassin," she said shortly. "The lack of ensuing incident implies it was a lone actor."

She carefully did not vouch for Leia's total safety, and Han's grip tightened.

"Let's go, Leia."

"No," she said simply.

Carlist looked as if he had half a mind to help Han haul her off. He certainly was looking at Han thoughtfully enough, and Leia slipped her elbow away from Han gently before the two of them could get any ideas. She still felt cocooned in the surrealism of it. She was used to this sort of thing, wasn't she? It had been a long time, but she hadn't forgotten.

She moved to step past Carlist to her podium, but Han cut her off, his eyes flashing.

"No," he snapped, his voice low in the back of his throat. "_No_, Leia."

"I _am_ finishing this speech, Han," she said quietly.

She rested a hand on his. He flexed his fingers. He glared at her, and his jaw tightened, and whatever he saw in her eyes, he didn't seem to think he could argue with it, but a soft, pleading light flashed in his eyes - _please, don't do this_, he seemed to beg.

She did it anyway, but with something tugging at her heart, nagging at the back of her mind - was she showing strength, or stupidity? She plucked Han's hand off of her, and shoved past Carlist, staking her place at the podium. She stood, silent, for a long time, and she was sure she looked as cold as they'd ever seen her. When finally she spoke, her voice was in command, bold, but light.

"If you would all retake your seats," she began graciously. "I do promise you, I am not that easy to silence."

She paused, and let her lips turn up wryly.

"Thank you, Lausta," she said, inclining her head at the woman, "for that talented display. It certainly makes a point for the next one, does it not? Try harder."

There was nervous laughter. Behind her, some of Lausta's women fanned out; others hopped down, their boots sounding off with hollow thuds as they took up posts along the front of the stage. Curiously, Leia noticed that some of them had produced rifles, which they held across their chests expertly. Where in the _stars _had they been hiding those?

Some took their seats, others remained standing. Local peacekeepers were quietly attending to the body in the back. Han's seat in the front remained empty. Lausta placed herself at Leia's left shoulder, and Han, too, refused to budge. Out of the corner of her eye, Leia saw him unlatch the holster at his hip, and remove his blaster in one threatening, fluid motion. From a political standpoint, the standpoint of a leader and a peacemaker, she wasn't sure she liked the display of visual violence, but she knew better than to try to make Han disarm himself.

Leia let silence reign for a moment, drawing in a deep breath. She had not released her hold on the Force. Was Luke watching this somewhere, was Rouge, was her father? When she watched it back later, what would the broadcast show - how would she see herself, and the chaos around her? He wasn't touching her, but still, Han's fear was palpable; she could almost taste his heartbeat and the anxious horror pinching his nerves.

With so many eyes upon her, she resumed her speech, her voice rising and rising, fierce and regal and unbowed. Periodically, her eyes flicked towards her husband as he stood there, just slightly forward of her, his blaster held just so, not pointing at this crowd, but menacing it all the same - a sworn shield if there ever was one. She couldn't hear herself speak, but she finished every word of what she'd meant to say, and the applause that roared in her ears at the end of it drowned out anything else. She had never been one to bask in attention and applause, and she did not now, either, but she was proud not to have been shaken by this act, proud that whatever damage this attempt had sought to cause had been so seamlessly prevented.

An ache started in her ribs and shoulders, muscles protesting the rough way she'd been tossed to the floor, though she bore no resentment towards Han. Those aches confirmed she was alive, and so did the rush of blood in her ears, and the three bundles of emotion in her heart that tied her to her children, and the warm, desperate way Han held her arm when she finally let him whisk her away, the smoldering echo of the blaster bolts still ringing in her ears.


	2. Hours Later

a/n: this story is told in clusters of time (hours, days, weeks...though the weeks part won't really be that many weeks, it just fits the theme - ha).

** for a little background, if it's needed:** this is about **14 ABY** \- Jaina Solo is **5 years old**, Noura Solo is **20 months old** (ish), and Max Solo is **8 months old** (ish). Leia has not been Chief of State for very long.

* * *

_Hours Later_

* * *

There was a blurry clarity to the way the rest of the day passed. Leia reflected on the phenomenon later, as she stood on the balcony of her home, staring off not into the traffic of Coruscant but the private inner courtyards of their secluded community. Warm wind, always tinged with the urban scent of carbon and exhaust, pollution and metal, stirred the greenery far below, and with heightened senses enveloping her, Leia could almost see the faint twitch of the flower petals on the distant trees.

_Blurry clarity._There was an oxymoron, a strange and peculiar way of describing things - but it worked. She had been well spoken, firm, and dogged as she finished her speech; and she'd been collected and cool as she dealt with the chaos throughout the rest of the day. It hadn't gone normally; of course it hadn't. The Media scrambled. Lausta, flushed with adrenaline over the whole ordeal, had lambasted herself and her team for letting a threat get so close, which Leia dismissed as an absurd reaction from the stoic security chief - threats happened, she reasoned, and close? Lausta had killed the prospective assassin with a blaster bolt that rang out _before_ he himself had fired.

She'd seen the sharp movement. She'd seen he raised blaster. She'd taken him down. And yet, she was harsh on herself; on the network of eyes and ears that hadn't heard a whisper, hadn't been the wiser until he was dead on the floor of the airy venue.

It had been a him. That didn't surprise Leia. She had never seemed to inspire as much hatred in women as she did in men and as it were, in her experience, men were more prone to put weapons to their disgruntled feelings. Women usually soaked in resentment and strategic hatred, winning revenge and satisfaction in other ways. That wasn't to say women weren't violent. Leia wasn't a fool. She herself had been violent at certain points in her life and knew, quite simply, that she could be violent again, if need be. If Jaina, for example, had been targeted, if any of her children had crosshairs on them, Leia knew, without a doubt, that she could break a neck with the flick of her wrist. It wasn't the right use of her power, but she'd do it. Luke would disapprove, _but she'd do it. _

Which was why, she reasoned, she couldn't hold Han responsible for his manic reaction to the event - or rather, _wouldn't_. She was well aware of how threatening it looked to have had him standing before her podium, blaster damn near fixed on the crowd, and yet she'd let him stand. He hadn't left her side the rest of the day, barely holstering that blaster. When he had, the leather strap of his holster had remained unlatched, loose, twitching slightly under his hand as he thumbed it pointedly, a reminder to onlookers that despite all the years and all the changes, he could still be the Han Solo who shot to kill without the slightest cautious twitch of a lash.

She had watched the Media coverage - oh, and how it still raged - watched them fawn in awe over her decision to continue the speech. They had taken it for what she wanted them to: unshakable courage, the refusal to be silenced, but they weren't privy to the way Han's eyes had seethed at her when they walked off stage; they hadn't heard his tight, whispered anger in the speeder later - _Are you out of your fucking mind, Leia? Are you totally out of your fucking mind?_\- nor had they heard his choked whispers later, holding her tight - _Come here. Come here, Sweetheart. My life flashed in front've my eyes. Fuck. I was so...scared. _

Han's fear, his confession to the fear, clutched at her heart painfully. She'd watched him hug the children tighter, just as she had, watched him give them their bedtime kisses with more protective ferocity. She thought of the reports that flashed images of him standing there next to her, blaster drawn, and swooned over the romance of it; commentators who even had a smile and a suggestive comment for the way his hand never left the small of her back the rest of the day as he escorted her about.

She hadn't gone directly home after the speech. She'd stayed, against his wishes, just like she'd stayed on stage, when both of them were still thrumming with the terror of what had just happened. She had watched Media coverage with an odd detachment, her brow slightly furrowed - recognizing herself, and nodding, but also conceding to Han in the back of her mind - was she absolutely mad, continuing? What if there _had_ been a second wave of attacks?

But the attempt was so unsophisticated, so desperate. Lausta had not yet come up with a full report on the incident, but through grit teeth and a taut jaw, she had ascertained that it appeared to be a lone hound attack, the perpetrator not a bounty hunter but some disgruntled activist. _Activist,_ she'd said, and Leia had pursed her lips, finding that peculiar. She herself had been an activist. She found it difficult to associate the word with someone who would use violence to try and take down a _peaceful_ ruler.

Because that was how she thought of herself, of course - that was what the Republic had been, for so long now: peaceful. No galaxy as large and diverse as theirs could ever be utterly devoid of conflict, but violence was down, skirmishes were few and far between, and widespread compliance with a glittering democracy was the norm. And so why now, and who...?

Leia clutched at the mug in her hands. The tea she'd made was still too hot to drink. Han wanted her to take a personal day tomorrow, but she grimaced at the thought. She felt she'd set the tone by staying the course through the speech. She wanted to wait a bit to take a breather, so it would seem unrelated - she wanted there to be no visible cracks in the foundation of her government; for Sith's sake, she'd only taken over for Mon Mothma four months ago, and the responsibility of that was daunting beyond words. She was no stranger to governance, and yes, she had shed blood for this democracy and helped build it, but in taking the reigns she felt such a duty to her mentor, such a deep desire not to fail. If there was any fragility to be found in her, any weakness in her tenure as Chief of State, how fast could it turn to turmoil?

She was not silly enough to think that a mere ten years or so out from the Emperor's death, they were unbreakable and secure. Complacency could be the death of them.

Tight-lipped, she tried to figure out if she was scared. She couldn't decide. She was possibly in shock, that was fair. That would explain the blurry clarity. A one and done attempt didn't seem anything to be frightened of, certainly not after the horrors she'd survived in the past. And she was used to people trying to kill her.

Unbidden, her own inner thoughts challenged that assertion once again - _but are you? _Excepting this morning, when _was_ the last time someone had tried to kill her?

She drew a blank trying to remember, and in the blankness, her heart hardened a little. Well, it didn't matter; it was over. She was fine, Jaina, Noura, and Max were fine - and hardly worse for wear - and Han would forgive her, because Han _always_ forgave her, and _because_ she was fine. She cocked her head, and ground her teeth. She drew in a deep breath, awash with awareness of the world around her. One of the benefits of her comfort with the Force these days is that she no longer needed Han - or anyone - to make loud noises to announce their appearance behind her. She could just tell they were there.

"Will you come inside?" Han asked sharply.

His approach had been silent, except to her. She turned her head slightly, and he was standing there looking haggard, half-asleep. His hair was sticking up, and already, a swarthy shadow was crawling across his jaw. The look reflected how he must have felt all day, and she felt a stab of guilt for getting up and leaving him alone in bed. He scratched his jaw, eyes narrowing.

"Leia," he said.

"The weather is nice," she murmured, and then frowned at herself. She had no idea why she'd said something so mundane and irrelevant. She wasn't even sure she was out here to enjoy the weather.

Han took a few steps towards her.

"Don't stand out in the open like that," he said.

Leia arched her brows. She extended her mug a little.

"Han, it's our courtyard," she said. "No one's going to shoot me in the courtyard."

He gnashed his teeth at her.

"How d'you know?" he snapped. "You think someone was gonna shoot you at the arena this morning?"

Leia pursed her lips.

"No one _did_ shoot me this morning," she pointed out.

All the same, she stepped inside, and she regretted mincing words. He was right; she hadn't expected an attack at that idyllic, peaceful venue this morning, and perhaps that was the problem. She hadn't expected it at all. He hadn't. None of them had. And it didn't seem to make sense. A grimace touched his mouth, and he strode past her to shut the doors. The clatter of latch, as it locked home, echoed in her ears, almost like the fading crack of a blaster.

Han muttered something under his breath. If he were someone else, Leia might have attuned her power to amplify it, to eavesdrop, but she never did that to Han. His privacy was as important to her as hers, and there was _no_ intimacy between them if she could read his soul like a book only because of her sensitivity, rather than because of their trust, and their love.

He gave a tight, controlled yawn, and Leia raised an eyebrow. It almost looked as if he had faked that yawn, somehow. As if he were trying to give the impression that he'd been asleep. He _had_ been asleep when she slipped out. Or at least, doing a damn good job of pretending. Probably he'd been finding some escape in sleep.

"Why are you up?" she asked softly.

"Check on the kids," he grunted.

Leia didn't say anything. It wasn't really an answer. None of the three had made a noise; she'd know if they had, and Han didn't set alarms to check on them, so he couldn't have specifically woken up for that.

She raised her mug to her lips and took a sip. Han eyed her almost nervously, and twitched an annoyed glance at the balcony. She sighed.

"It isn't common knowledge that we live here, Han," she pointed out.

"Not this spot specifically," he retorted stubbornly. "But this area. Wouldn't take much to just take shots at every penthouse – "

"Shall I arrange a move into an underground bunker, then?" she interrupted, arching her brow.

For some reason, in her head, it sounded like a joke. When said out loud, it came off as horrendously mocking, and her face fell at the same time his did.

"Why aren't you taking this seriously?" Han asked after a moment.

Leia compressed her lips. She reached out to touch his wrist. She thought he might yank away from her, but he didn't. She turned his palm over, and held his hand.

"I am," she promised quietly. "I _am_, Han."

Lausta had half her team doing deep information dives on the man who had gone after her, trying to find connections, accomplices, histories, motives. He was rather young to bear political grudges of the Imperial sort, so there was a certain element of intrigue to it all.

Han considered her for a moment.

"Wouldn't say _no_ to an underground bunker," he grumbled finally, grinding his teeth.

Leia laughed. She stepped forward and tucked herself against him. His arms came a moment later, and he rested his chin on her head. His heart thudded erratically in his chest, and Leia pursed her lips, making the _softest_ of shushing noises, as if she could quiet it. He turned his nose into her hair and breathed her in, and then he clutched at her back tightly, little pricks of his nails through her shirt, and abruptly her throat closed off.

Almost clinically, she frowned at herself, realizing what was happening. It was like an out of body experience. His grip tightened, her chest constricted, her vision went black for a moment, and then she jolted suddenly, accidentally slamming her hand up into his wrist. Hot tea spilled over both of their arms, and Han leaned back, startled.

"What the - ?" he started, frowning.

Leia stared at the tea dripping off her arm, her eyes slightly wide. She pursed her lips, taking a deep breath. She'd nearly jumped out of her skin. She felt…the crawling, poking needles of a panic attack limping up her spine, and then took another deep breath, and the feeling faded away. She was so very in control of that now.

And she didn't jump like that anymore. Not when Han touched her. Not when anyone did. Not for a long time.

"Sweetheart?" Han asked very softly.

She noticed his hands had come off her completely; he was holding his palms just slightly over her shoulders, letting them hover. Muscle memory, it seemed; his hands had sprung off her in a flash, respectful, and nonthreatening.

Leia transferred her mug from one hand to the other, and cleared her throat coolly.

"I suppose I am a little on edge," she muttered, eyeing his chest darkly. There were some tea droplets there, and she ran her knuckles over his skin to dry them off. She sucked on her knuckles afterwards, still contemplating the moment.

She briefly thought of Han tackling her to the floor of that stage, but that only deepened her thoughtful look. Yes – he'd _pinned_ her, but he hadn't intended to _hurt_ her.

She felt his eyes on her, and he lowered his hands. He rolled his head back and forth tensely.

"Come back to bed," he suggested gruffly.

Leia's stomach clenched at the idea. She didn't know if the reluctance showed on her face – she hoped it didn't. She licked her lips, closing two hands around the wet mug, instead. For a moment, she thought about the evening; how she'd come home, thrown herself into the rigmarole of feeding the kids, bathing them, rocking them and putting them to bed – how Max had barely started his soft, baby snoring before she and Han were behind a locked bedroom door.

She'd _clawed_ at him, and he at her, breathless and shaking, half-clothed and not even making use of the bed that first time – an affirmation of life and safety that took place against the wall of the 'fresher. He'd held a thumb to her mouth for her to bite on, so she'd be quieter, and she'd whacked the water on with her elbow, soaking them. It was over so fast she was still aching on the edge as he stripped off the rest of their clothes, rinsing the day down the drain, and knelt, his arm around her waist, and worked his tongue between her legs until she could barely stand.

Rough intimacy, desperate, grateful intimacy, followed by the slower, more burning kind, Leia settled on top of him, a comforting weight on his hips so he could touch her all over, look up at her, feel her there, know she was alive and unharmed. All at once they seemed to remember that life was fleeting and that they didn't take enough time to ravish each other, and the way he clung to her after, breathing heavy against her neck, told her so much more than words.

They'd exhausted themselves to sleep, and here they were. She had no doubt it was a nightmare that had woken Han, and he'd been shaken to find her gone, and as for her – it wasn't a nightmare, but restless anxiety had shaken her suddenly and coldly out of sleep, and that's why she went for tea, why she went outside to challenge the open air that Han now saw as such a threat.

"Leia," Han said slowly, folding his arms. He almost went so far as to hug himself. "You're…lookin' at me funny," he said honestly, drawing his bottom lip into his teeth. He bit at it, and the gesture made him look years younger.

Leia cleared her throat. Her eyes softened almost airily.

"Am I?" she asked.

She wanted to wince as she said it. She didn't sound like herself. She swallowed hard, and sighed, and then she got her voice back. She felt tired, and confused, and that made her wary. Shadows hissed in her mind, and for the hundredth time this night, she frowned to herself.

Could she still hear the echo of the blaster bolt, shrieking past?

"Han, I don't want to," she paused, breaking off. "Noura's awake," she breathed, sensing it instantly.

Han flicked his eyes up. He didn't hear anything yet.

"Leia," Han began haggardly. "I _need_ you to come sleep next to me," he admitted. "That's all. I need you – "

Noura cried out. For a few beats, there was silence, and then she cried again, a low, mournful wail.

"Daddy? _Daaaaady_!"

It was _always_ Han she called for in the middle of the night. Softly, before either of them could say anything, the entry chimes rang, and Leia closed her eyes lightly, her nostrils flaring.

"That's Father," she said decisively.

She didn't need the Force to know. To her surprise, a resentful scowl curved Han's mouth.

"What the fuck's he doing here?" he muttered, uncharacteristically hostile. Leia pursed her lips slightly, but Han went on, scratching the back of his neck. "It's late. You think he'd _get_ that I get you to myself tonight, after I almost," he trialed off, gritting his teeth.

He shook his head, and let out a short sigh.

"I'll get Noura," he said calmly.

Before she could say anything, he slipped past her, jostling her only slightly, and she sensed he needed any reason to touch her, to brush against her, convince himself she was still there. Han had been close to tears earlier this evening, tangled up in a mass of sheets and arms and legs – or perhaps he _had_ been in tears; there was always a chance she'd confused them with sweat, when he mashed his face into her mane of hair.

Something in her twisted, and shouted at her to go comfort him. Something else in her was stiff, cool; this was such a small thing, comparatively. She closed her eyes grimly, and nudged on the baby monitor they kept in the living room. After a moment of crackling, she heard Noura start to coo instead of whine, and very softly, Han's gruff, gentle _shushing, _accompanied by the garbled murmur of a lullaby.

Before she went to the hall to let her father in, she return the monitor's volume to the lowest setting, one only she could hear if she enhanced her hearing. Hazily, she thought she should tell her father to go home; Han was right, he had _no_ business here tonight – but a different part of her, with clarity, saw no problem with letting him in while Han soothed Noura.

She still hummed with an unnerving, vague reluctance to go to bed with Han, and she gnashed her teeth at it grimly. It was a peculiar and unwanted feeling, and there was a chance an idle talk with her father could dispel it with the rest of the day's stark blurriness.

* * *

"Do you want some tea, Father?"

He demurred, and Leia arched an eyebrow at him. He certainly looked like he could use it. There were dark circles under his eyes. The wrinkles on his face looked more pronounced than usual, and it always made her chest tighten a little when she was reminded that her father was, well - old. It seemed unfair, that he should continue to age, when his survival had been such a miracle. Those lines of wisdom around his eyes and mouth reminded her that no matter what had happened, inevitably, she was doomed to lose him.

She accepted his refusal, though she went into the kitchen to wipe down her still drippy mug with a towel, and wash the stickiness off her hands. In the back of her mind, she felt a twinge that indicated Max was stirring, and she gave a soft sigh. He usually did wake up, if Noura did, and likewise, Noura rarely slept through Max's fitful nights. They shared the nursery, now; Leia didn't feel they were far enough apart to warrant their own rooms yet, but Max had outgrown the newborn cradle she and Han kept in their room, and Noura wasn't old enough for a toddler bed. She wasn't sure if they were getting more or less sleep with Max out of their room but sharing with Noura, and she didn't spend much time trying to calculate it.

One of the tenants of parenthood was exhaustion, no matter what the sleeping arrangements were. At least Jaina nearly always slept through the babies waking up. She'd trained herself to do so when Noura was a newborn.

"Some things never change, do they?" Bail asked, as Leia came back into the sitting room.

Leia sat down comfortably in the corner of the sofa, her usual spot. She curled one leg under her and held her mug delicately between two palms, smiling, in spite of herself. He was right; some things never did. She and her father were alike in that they often stayed up late into the night after major events, studying, thinking, planning. She remembered he'd come over after _that_ press conference, so many years ago, and said much the same thing to her. He was more welcome now, of course, and there was little chance of Han kicking him out in a cool rage. There should be, at least. He had looked somewhat thunderous at her revelation that Bail was here.

"It's a wonder biology alone hasn't forcibly changed it for you," Leia quipped.

Bail arched an eyebrow.

"What a sophisticated way to call me old," he retorted.

Leia grinned. He compressed his lips, folding his hands and resting them on a knee, sitting rather stiffly in the armchair. She couldn't quite tell if it was psychological or physical discomfort that made him stiff; did he, too, feel he was overstepping by barging in, or was he just suffering the usual aches and pains of age?

"Is Aunt Rouge asleep?" Leia asked.

"Oh, yes," Bail sighed. "She took a toddy. But don't think she wasn't hysterical," he said, grimacing.

"I can imagine," Leia muttered.

She felt a flare of irritation, as she usually did at her aunt's histrionics. Fear and concern was one thing, but hysterics? Rouge hadn't even been there. She hadn't felt the rush, felt the threat. It should have been enough to calm her down, to know Leia was okay, to see her stand up and keep going, but no doubt she'd driven Bail mad with her hyperventilating worry.

"She couldn't believe you stayed up there, finishing that speech," Bail went on, slowly. "Neither can I, for that matter," he added, lifting his eyes.

He looked at her almost critically, and Leia shifted, her mouth tightening slightly.

"Well," she said, voice crisp. "You can both commiserate with Han regarding that."

Bail snorted.

"I figured," he said. "I didn't need the images of him standing there next to you looking murderous to know he'd be furious at such a stunt."

"It wasn't a stunt," Leia said sharply.

Her father just raised her eyebrow at her, and she fell silent, chastised. It wasn't a stunt - _was_ it? At that precise moment in time, she hadn't seen a better option; the threat had ended, and the gathering was full of chaos, what better time to pull it together and present a strong front? She grit her teeth behind tight lips, and looked down into her mug of tea. Was he here to admonish her, or pick her brain? She was not entirely interested in either. For admonishment, she had Han's accusing eyes and the wounded, sharp aura that surrounded him, and as for analyzing that little assassin - well, it was over; why drag it out? This was just an unfortunate anomaly -

"I hadn't," Bail began, hesitating awkwardly. Leia glanced up at him, surprised he was so tentative. "I hadn't really gotten a chance to check on you," he went on. "I think you'd understand that I couldn't just...go to sleep without doing so. Checking on you as a father, not as a former Viceroy checks on a Princess, out in public."

They'd shared a quiet moment in her office earlier, cursory and comforting; a tight hug, a reassurance, and she had insisted then, as she had on stage, that the day was proceeding as planned. Lausta, of course, had demanded an overhaul of security measures, which was logical, and which Leia allowed as she maneuvered the rest of her day.

She thought of the time she'd packed off Han, Jaina, and Noura to the Embassy when the girls had Qii Pox, so she could protect Max. She'd known they were safe, as safe as they could be, and yet she'd tossed and turned all night, because raising Han on the comm real quick to check on them and say goodnight hadn't been as satisfying as if she'd been able to lay a hand on their backs and and try to kiss and soothe their fevers and rashes away. She did understand, as a mother; she _did. _

Unexpectedly, Leia yawned, her shoulders relaxing. She poked a finger into her tea idly, to see if it was still too hot, and of course it was too cool now. It had been ignored for too long, steam curling up lazily, and then it had been jostled and spilled, and now it was tepid and unappealing. She flicked some of the liquid off and took a sip anyway, deciding not to waste it. Or rather, to use it as a prop - tea, or kaf, or anything of the sort, was an excellent prop during conversation.

"How are you?" Bail asked simply. "Are you okay?"

"Hmm?" Leia murmured, as if the question took her by surprise. It didn't, but then it did, at the same time. Didn't she look okay? She looked at him critically over the rim of the mug, and lowered it. "Oh, yes," she said quietly. "Yes."

Her father continued to look at her, yet she remained calm, and sure. Her brow even crinkled a little, frustrated that he didn't seem to believe her. Why couldn't those surrounding her take her word for it? She didn't deny that the event had been jarring, but she was taking it in stride and it. was. _over. _

"I'm fine, Father," she reiterated.

Bail looked almost wary. In fact, he looked like Han had the time Leia swore she didn't need help putting Jaina's levi-trike together, and then had shoved it all into his hands two hours later, her brow creased in resigned irritation, blushing and swearing. He leaned forward, unclasping his hands, drumming his fingers on his knee, agitated.

"You didn't know this was going to happen, did you?" he asked curtly. She immediately knew he didn't mean to sound so short, and she let it go. "Try to draw out a pesky threat and...catch it?"

Leia smiled ruefully.

"Clever," she remarked, "but no. Maybe when I was younger, and more immortal," she quipped, thinking of the ego and gall such a plan would take - and remembering a few traps she, and many others, had deliberately sprung during the Rebellion. "I'd never take that risk now. Not with Han and the babies in my life."

The troubling thing was, Lausta said that all threat analyses had been rather mundane lately - the more violent ones, silent. And not unusually so, not silent enough to indicate something dire brewing. Things were just stable, _good,_ and Leia wasn't much hated. The usual lunatics and radicals spit teeth and raged at her, but the security team knew how to separate posturing from real call to action. She trusted them to do so - and no, there hadn't been any credible threats, no dire warnings; in the past, Leia had listened to them, and allowed renewed plans or alternate routes, when something seemed certain, or too possible.

This was...anomalous. And thus...it mustn't devastate their lives.

Bail sighed. He leaned back, shoulders slumping. Apparently, that was a niggling thought that had kept him awake, horrified him all day. _Kriff,_ Leia thought grimly, _don't put that thought in Han's head - he'll walk out the door and take all of them with him. _An over dramatic thought, and an unlikely one. An image came to mind of Han trying to make a dignified, outraged exit with three children, five and under, hanging on him, and tripping him up, and absurdly, she almost laughed.

"How _are_ the babies?" Bail asked, his brow creasing. When she called all three of them babies, it made Bail smile; it seemed so fluffy and cutesy and incongruous to the way Leia generally presented herself.

"Blissfully unaware," Leia sighed. "They all sensed some tension and fear, naturally. I knew that this morning. But they're none the wiser. Yorev and Gareth didn't have the Holo on, so they hadn't seen it. It was a little comical, hearing them describe the sudden meltdown of all three."

She smiled tightly, thinking of it. When she'd called as soon as she was back in her office, both herself and Han reflected in blue glimmers to soothe the babies, Yorev had been frazzled, shaking his head - _they all went off at once, like firecrackers! Gareth and I had no idea what was wrong! _Two caretakers with three Force sensitive babies was a somewhat even ratio - certainly a privilege for Leia and Han - but even though the two young men were used to the strangeness, it still sometimes caught them off guard.

"Are you going to tell them?" Bail asked.

"Why would we?" Leia asked flatly, blinking at him. She pursed her lips, skeptical. "We'd have to explain what assassination is in the first place."

Her voice was dry. She imagined that conversation - trying to tell a preschooler, and a toddler, and a _baby, _that someone tried to kill Mommy, and perhaps having to explain what killing was, too, and then having to get in the political nature of Leia's job and - no. Much better to gloss over it, for now. Much better to tell Jaina, who had tearfully demanded to know what was happening, that Mommy had just fallen down and tripped, and it made her heart jump up really fast.

_Don't be klutumsy, you're not allowed to!_ \- Jaina had ordered, mixing up the words she wanted to use and storming away. She'd made Han laugh, though it was hollow and haggard. '_Klutumzy_.' They were definitely going to be teasing her with that one for a long, long time.

Bail grunted. That was fair. He and Breha hadn't ever regaled Leia with tales of the threats against them, though those had all been external, and by the time she was fourteen, Leia was ferreting out secrets she never should have known.

"How's Han?" he asked pointedly, watching Leia take a sip of tea.

He looked around. It struck him as odd that Han wasn't around if Leia was up. He'd been glued to her side all day - understandably. Bail had only been watching the speech via Holo, but he was sure the image of Han standing there, blaster drawn, potential violence etched into every hard muscle of his face, would stick with him for a long time - and it wasn't an image that would daunt him, or make him afraid. Rather, he'd felt relieved, he'd thought, _oh, thank the Gods, if anyone gets close to her, Han will annihilate them, and I'll buy him dinner after._ It was one of the most violent thoughts Bail had ever had, and he'd felt no sorrow over it.

Leia let out a long, slow breath, slow, slow, _slow_ as she lowered her mug with a finality that indicated she was about to set it aside, and abandon the facade of tea drinking. She shook her head, her eyebrows raised.

"He's not okay," she said bluntly. "He says he is. But he is not."

Bail pursed his lips, on the verge of responding immediately. _Well, neither are you_ \- he was about to say, almost caustic, but something stopped him. He refrained, and Leia arched a brow curiously, wondering what he'd held back. Instead, her father just looked at her, waiting.

"Not that I can blame him," Leia said after a moment, and wasn't sure if she said it because her father's stare was implying she should, or because she believed it.

She _did_ believe it. Of course Han was shaken; there was nothing wrong with that.

"Where is he?" Bail asked. "Is he asleep?"

"No," Leia answered.

There was a soft jingle as Zozy came trotting down the stairs, the identification tags on his collar dancing. He exclusively slept in the nursery, so if he was out...Leia cocked her head at him as he darted over to Bail, flicking his tail and chirping softly. Bail reached down one hand patiently to pet him, and Zozy leapt up into Bail's lap. He perched on his haunches smugly, ears pricked up.

"Is Han coming downstairs?" Leia asked the mooka seriously.

Zozy swished his tail at her calmly. She heard Han's foosteps on the stairs a moment later, and then he appeared, carrying Noura and Max. Noura helped him, her arms looped around his neck and her legs comically stretched around his waist, clinging to him sleepily, and with one arm he grasped Max against his shoulder in a perfect balance. Bail looked ready to shove Zozy off him and get up to help, but Zozy chirped pointedly. Han's eyes were dry and red and tired, and he sighed as if he hadn't wanted the late night nursery visit to turn out like this.

Leia sat forward as he came closer, crouching down and leaning his shoulder to her. Leia set her tea mug aside and took Max, assuming he wanted to be fed, and Han straightened back up.

"I don't think Noury will go back down until he does," Han grunted.

Leia nodded. She turned Max in her arms, frowning for a moment at her attire. She wore pajamas, but they weren't conducive to subtle nursing. Nursing around family didn't really make her squeamish, but whipping her shirt off and exposing herself until Max got settled did. Han watched her for a moment, and then stepped forward and in front of her. She shot his back a grateful look, and pulled up her shirt, taking one arm out of the sleeve and letting the material hang around her neck.

"Hey," Han greeted Bail, and didn't say much more as he rocked Noura.

"Oh, hi, Baba," Noura whined through a yawn. She never said just _hi_; it was always '_oh, hi_,' as if she'd just decided the person she was speaking to was worthy of her notice.

Max latched on, and Leia jutted out her foot to nudge Han and let him know he could move. He nodded in acknowledgement, grunted softly, and went into the kitchen.

"What are you getting her?" Leia asked, cupping one hand around the back of Max's head.

He kicked her elbow in protest, and she let her hand fall off, only a little offended. Max was not a very snugly nurser, and the girls had been; it had taken some time for Leia to adjust to the fact that he was all business about it.

"Spicy drink," Han answered, his voice floating out from the dark kitchen, completely deadpan.

"Spicy drink?" Bail repeated.

"It's what she calls carbonated water," Leia said, looking down at Max.

He looked back at her pointedly, and then, after a moment, closed his eyes. Leia sighed, and sat back. She was in the process of weaning him, but tonight she didn't feel like forcing a bottle on him instead. For the first few months of his life, she'd tried nursing both him and Noura - even though Noura was already more formula fed than Jaina had ever been - but it was too hard. Instead, Noura had gotten the shaft, and Max had spent three months in a sling at her breast, attending more meetings and senate sessions than either of his sisters, mostly because he was just so calm and _quiet. _He was almost nine months old now, though, and he was a little wilder, a little more alert, and Leia just couldn't nurse him like she used to, not since she'd taken over for Mon. She knew the transitory period would slow down and settle soon, but right now...she wanted to sleep all night when she could.

They could give a mother-of-the-year award to someone else.

That thought bristled through her brain, and she smirked softly. These were her usual, normal evening thoughts - but for the near nuclear outlying event that had occurred this morning, this_ could_ be a normal evening. It could be, but it was not. Han was on edge, Han thought she was going to be snatched away from him as she stood in the safety of their home. Her father was restless, sleepless, worried about her. Two of the three children were awake, and she -

She was okay.

Wasn't she?

"Leia," Han said gruffly, pausing by the sofa before he went back upstairs. "You gotta get some sleep," he said. "If you're not gonna take the day tomorrow. You gotta come to bed."

He gave her a look, muttered a farewell to Bail, and went lightly back up the stairs. Leia heard Noura tapping the sippy cup Han had given her on the wall, and imagined Han rolling his eyes, but not stopping her. With any luck, Jaina wouldn't wake up. She shifted her arms, resting her elbow on the arm of the sofa to relieve herself of some of Max's weight, tilting her head at her father. She pursed her lips thoughtfully, and his eyes lingered where Han had been. He had clearly noticed Han's subtle hostility towards his presence, and he certainly hadn't missed the undertone of resentful sarcasm that tinged his words - _if_ you're _not_ gonna _take the day_ tomorrow -

Leia twitched her nose, patting Max's back lightly.

"I should," she remarked, nodding at the echo of Han's words. "Go to bed."

Bail nodded.

"You_ should_ take the day tomorrow," he agreed pointedly.

Leia rolled her eyes, exasperated.

"I am fine, Father," she repeated, standing up abruptly. It took quite a lot of grace, to stand up so confidently with a baby nursing, without jostling him to distraction or letting her shirt slip out of its delicate arrangement around her shoulders.

Again, he looked about ready to say something, and stopped himself. He merely nodded, and stood, Zozy leaping off his lap in a fluid pounce and climbing up into the spot Leia had just vacated instead. He leaned forward, touched Leia's elbow, and kissed her forehead. He patted Max's head gently as well, careful not to disturb him. Max twitched anyway, and Leia smiled a little. Looking up, she took a deep breath.

"Do you want to stay in the guest suite?" she asked. "Or - "

"No, I'll return home," Bail said.

She nodded, and inclined her head, letting him go before her. She showed him out, exchanging familial pleasantries, and then when he was gone, she sighed, and leaned her head against the door, staring down at Max while she stood there in the dark hallway. She had the urge to go back onto the balcony, enjoy the warm air, almost defiantly. No one could _take_ her safety away from her, she wasn't going to _let_ them. This was an outrage, this morning's moment an invader; how dare it happen? How dare - but she shook her head, soothing herself.

It was over. It didn't matter.

She yawned, making her way back towards the stairs. She caught Zozy inching forward on the sofa, darting his tongue out to lick at her abandoned tea, and she clicked her tongue at him. Immediately he was off the couch and prancing up the stairs, and Leia followed. Max was nodding off, his head lolling away from her breast, as she reached the landing, and the thought occurred to her that this moment - nursing him - made her feel alive as she had in Han's arms earlier this evening, in the 'fresher and in bed. There was so much around her that made her feel alive, and no room for shadows or threats.

Han was in the rocking chair with Noura when she entered the nursery. Usually, when he rocked her - either of the babies - he fell asleep before they did, but tonight he was wide awake. Leia shifted Max to her shoulder, and Han blinked, suddenly smirking at her. She was sure she looked amusing, her shirt all tangled up and half off, wrestling with the sleepy baby. She was quick about placing him in his crib by the window - Noura's, which had been Jaina's, was over in the corner - and then she righted her shirt, and turned to help Han put Noura down.

This time, Zozy hopped up in the rocking chair when Han vacated it. Noura clung to Han's shoulders, and then to Leia's hair and the cotton of her shirt, mumbling half-awake protests about being put in her own place. She still seemed a bit agitated, and Leia, resting a palm on Han's chest, said without thinking:

"You're so upset you're making her anxious, Han."

She meant it as an afterthought, but she recognized that it likely sounded condescending. She winced, kissing Noura before she coaxed her to go into her own crib, and Han's eyes narrowed silently. He took a step back, watching her for a moment, then turned stiffly. He rested his palm on Max for a moment, then left the room, and she heard him creep into Jaina's room to check on her one more time. Cringing at herself, Leia sighed - why had that sounded so accusatory? She hadn't meant it to be, it was just...true.

Lifting her hand off Noura, Leia left the nursery, leaving the door cracked open, and went down the hall to their bedroom. Han was already climbing into bed, gathering the covers around him without a word. Leia shut their door, turned off the remaining lamp in the room, and then shed her shorts and shirt in exchange for a loose cotton crop top and underwear. She slipped in beside Han, rolling close to him purposefully.

She found that the sudden spike of wariness she'd felt a little earlier was completely gone; she barely remembered it. She reached out to press her hand to his cheek and furrowed her brow, wondering, faintly in the back of her mind, what the hell had caused her to shy away like that. Why had she jumped, spilled the tea all over him? She inched closer, and kissed the bare skin of his chest where it had spilled, tasting faint honey. Han moved hesitantly, and then slid his arms around her, hanging onto her loosely for a moment before tightening into a real hug.

Han clutched at her, and Leia let him, closing her eyes. His chest pressed against hers, and she felt his heart racing - like it had raced this morning, when he held her under him, his body thrown protectively over her. She swallowed hard - what if Lausta had missed, what if the blaster bolts had hit him, because he was protecting her? Was _that_ fair to the children - lose a father, because he was protecting their mother; lose her, lose either of them? She felt a spike of irrational anger, and quashed it. Han breathed in and out a little too rapidly, his arms tight, and Leia drew in a breath, listening to his heartbeat.

_It's over,_ Leia thought heavily, maybe a little detached, but relieved, wanting to move on - but Han's fear enveloped her; he held her so tightly she had to pull away slightly, and when he slackened his grip reluctantly, she kissed his shoulder soothingly - this was par for the course, she was fine, and it was _over;_ he'd sleep this off tonight, wouldn't he?

Neither of them fell asleep for a long time.

* * *

_alexandra_

_story #395_


	3. Days Later

.

* * *

_Days Later_

* * *

Han slept on the sofa in her office.

Or rather, he appeared to be sleeping. Leia would comfortably bet that he was fading in and out; caught between real sleep and a delicate feint that he probably thought would foil potential intruding assassins. When he _did_ nod off into real sleep, it didn't make him any less formidable; Han had never shed his ability to be completely alert within seconds of being unceremoniously woken. His combination of street smarts, vagrant childhood, military training, and life on the run had imbued him with those sharp reflexes, and even these days, on late mornings at home when Jaina pounced on him to wake him, he only pretended he was groggy and too sleepy to play with her. It sent her into peels of laughter while she tried to drag him out of bed - but Leia knew he was acutely aware of his surroundings.

She also knew that currently, he wasn't getting any sleep, and as long as he was unobtrusive, she was reluctant to snap at him or demand he get over himself, shake it off, and let them all go back to normal. Particularly as this wasn't _too_ abnormal, so far. Han, who had contracted on and off with much freedom and success since his last stint with the military, had cut back significantly when Leia had taken over as Chief of State, just so there would be a stabilizing force at home while they readjusted. The Mothma Readjustment, he jokingly called it, just as Leia had referred to their overhaul of how-the-Solos-did-things right after Max was born as the MAS Readjustment - _Max Antilles Solo._

Things were settling -_ ish_. And now, unsettled, because of that unexpected, piercing, ominous blaster bolt, and the lone threat who had fired it. The _threat_, that's how she referred to him in her mind, when she let herself reflect on it - which she generally kept herself from doing, if at all possible. There was no point in doing so; it was a fleeting adrenaline shock that was now over and gone, and Leia felt the need to grit her teeth to keep from snapping whenever someone dared bring it up - and that wasn't entirely fair, as it had really only been a few days. Which was not nearly long enough for the news cycles to have dropped it yet, nor for her family to have shaken off the alarm and distress.

Han certainly wasn't shaking anything off. In all the time she'd known him, she'd rarely seen him actually jump or startle, but loud, sudden noises certainly seemed to be getting to him lately. Speeders backfiring or blaring horns in the distance of their home had him eyeing the windows with cold, calculating wariness. He was still agitated enough that he wasn't able to soothe Noura or Max very well; they were too sensitive to the tension sluicing off of him. Jaina didn't seem to bothered by it, but Jaina, lately, had taken to sharply and silently observing things - she was growing less bombastic and more thoughtful, and Leia was _sure_ she took in much more than she let on, even at her age.

Perhaps it was something about her experience at her day program, which was a pre-real-school, social education type thing. Jaina had some difficult adjusting to life with Noura, and then Noura and Max, but it seemed the day program mellowed her out in that she realized it wasn't _just_ at home that she couldn't always be the center of attention - the whole world had a lot of people, and a lot going on, and most of them didn't even know her name. Some children might have reacted to that with horror; Jaina seemed pleasantly interested.

A relief, if there ever was one. And it was also a relief that none of the children she played with seemed to have heard whispering or gleaned gossip from their parents, as to date, Jaina had not yet mentioned any awareness of the incident. Currently, Leia's biggest concern was the fear that Jaina would come skipping into her study or into the bedroom and ask what _assassination_ was or spit out a mouthful of questions about _someone trying to kill Mommy. _

That bothered her more than anything, the idea of having to talk to her daughter about the cruelty and the danger of the world - they discussed wariness of strangers, of course, and what to do if an adult or older kid made her feel scared or bullied, but there were some things Leia would rather avoid until...she'd just rather let her children be innocent as long as she could.

Noura and Max were easy to keep innocent. Jaina, less so. She had limited understanding right now, but a vast capacity to hear things, use her imagination, and repeat things, which had the potential to put Han and Leia in delicate situations where they had to deflect without lying or making something a shameful taboo.

And that, of course, was only going to get trickier as she matured.

Leia didn't know what she'd say to Jaina if this incident came up. She just didn't know. She was busy moving on from it herself, compartmentalizing it, stoically refusing to stew in it, despite the Media circus and Han's thinly veiled, angry horror. There was just no need to fall apart over something as fleeting as this, not when it had happened so many times before; not when she'd spent years with the shadows of death hanging over her and stalking her, and this was nothing, nothing compared to that.

At her breast, Max stirred, and Leia nearly jumped out of her skin. She compressed her lips to keep from snorting out loud at herself - she had forgotten he was there. When he slept, he was so _still _that for his first few weeks of life, she'd checked on him often, though now she knew it was just how he was. She glanced down to check on him, and found he was looking up at her contemplatively. She gave him a small smile, and reached in to adjust her blouse just slightly. Max lazily nosed over and nuzzled around instinctively. She ran her hand over the crown of his head, plucking very lightly at the sling to keep fabric away from his nose and mouth so he would be able to breathe even if he shifted around.

Perhaps her decision to bring Max along today was something in and of itself. She did bring him less and less now, just as she'd started to bring the girls less and less once they got around six-ish months old - but then again, he was her last baby, and her position as Chief of State was, surprisingly, more amenable to the kids being in her office, as it relied very much on delegation, public appearances, and - well, being a figurehead. Which, fortunately, was something she was quite familiar with.

Noura had been here earlier, too; Han had brought her with him after he'd dropped Jaina off at her day program. Winter had taken her around lunch, so she'd get a better nap, and so she could play with Arlo and Marisol. Noura benefited from being the second child in many ways - primarily because more of Leia's circle had children, now, whereas Jaina had been pretty much the first, and rather isolated in an adult world, until day school.

It felt right to have the children close right now, even if Han seemed torn between Leia having them under her protection - which meant they were away from home - and the normalcy of leaving them with Yoren and Gareth. He had almost balked at letting Jaina return to her day program - they had kept her out for two days following the event, just until gossip died down a little, and so the threat would seem farther away, but Leia stressed the importance of things going back to normal if they didn't want to scare her in any way. Han had only relented with Lausta told him she would be happy to send a security officer with Jaina, at which point he realized they already had that sort of thing, someone Jaina would feel perfectly at ease with.

And so, Chewbacca was at day school with Jaina, presumably drawing the eye of hoards of fascinated children, both because he was a Wookiee, and he was _the_ Wookiee; all of Jaina's classmates were the children of high ranking officials - they knew of Chewbacca. Leia was amusing herself imagining Chewie scrunched up in a tiny child's desk while preschoolers climbed him bravely, chattering questions and accidentally tugging his fur too hard.

He was used to it. To her chagrin, Leia's children treated Chewie like a living, breathing, glorified playground - but he stubbornly insisted that he adored it. Even to the point that he didn't mind that a few weeks ago, Noura had accidentally stuck her finger right into his cornea, necessitating an eye patch, which he wore during a week-long healing period.

A light lit up on one of the consoles at Leia's desk. Because Han was sleeping, Leia had set all of her auditory alarms to silent, so this indicated Tavska had someone outside for her. Leia waved her hand at her terminal and woke it up, using one hand to click to her messages. Indeed there was one from Tavska telling her both Lausta and Carlist had arrived for a briefing.

Leia depressed her intercom and said quietly: "Send them in."

Those two were close enough that continuing in this casual peace wouldn't harm appearances - and what they had was Han's business, too, as it were. Max was too young to be disturbed by whatever the briefing held, but if he suddenly decided to fuss and screech, either Han could take him out, or Tavska would see to it - Leia had never asked her to help with the babies when they were in the office, but as a mother herself, it had never occurred to Tavska _not_ to.

The door opened quietly and Carlist stepped in, followed by Lausta, who clutched a sleek holopad in the crook of her arm. Carlist nodded at her, then scanned the room, stopped when he saw Han, and cocked his head. Leia noticed a look of alarm cross Lausta's face as she came to a dead stop, barely avoiding slamming right into his back. Carlist pointed, questioning.

"It's alright," Leia said calmly. She ran her hand over Max's back. "You have the final intelligence briefs?"

Lausta's eyes flicked to Han narrowly.

"Well, yes," Carlist began, in an almost exaggerated whisper. "But there's no need to disturb - "

"He's not asleep," Leia said swiftly, quite sure he was in a pretending phase at the moment - right as Han said: "'M not sleepin'."

Leia smirked and cocked an eyebrow at Carlist as if to say -_ see?_

"Ah," Carlist grunted. "Are we disturbing," he paused suddenly, blinking. "Which one is that?" he asked, pointing at the baby slung close to Leia's chest.

Leia gave him an amused look.

"It's _Max_, Carlist," she snorted. "The littlest one."

"You have two very little ones," he retorted stubbornly. He grinned at her. "I get them confused," he joked.

Leia rolled her eyes. She pushed her seat back a little, peering past Carlist and watching as Han sat up and thrust a hand through his hair roughly.

"No, you're not disturbing him. Han, come get the baby," she requested.

He nodded and got up, stretching his arms behind his back.

"Hey, at least I enjoy a good, polite joke," Carlist said, arranging his face in one of mock sternness. "Madine is the one who thought it was funny to ask - "

"Yes, well, Rouge is still offended about that," Leia said dryly.

Crix Madine, returning nearly a year after Han had from the Western Reaches to discover there were now apparently three Solo children, had thought it extremely funny to ask Han if he was absolutely sure the third one was his. Rouge had overheard it and had taken it as an offense to Leia's honor.

"You got information for us?" Han grunted, stepping around Carlist and up to Leia's desk.

His voice was rough and devoid of amusement. In his defense, Madine's joke hadn't gone over well with him, and he clearly didn't think now was a good time to be joking at all, not when intelligence about the attack on his wife was hanging over their heads. Leia sighed quietly, and turned towards him, deftly freeing Max from the sling and then readjusting her blouse, untying the sling, and setting it aside as she neatly smoothed her clothing - all without flashing either Carlist or Lausta.

She was an old pro at it _now_, of course, but she was fairly sure that when Jaina was a baby, half the galaxy had caught a brief glimpse of her nipples. Not that she cared if some people had to be reminded what a female nipple existed for.

Han settled Max on his hip, and Max blinked around lazily, cocking his head at just a slightly funny angle. He always tilted his good ear towards sounds. He stuck one of his little hands into the pocket of Han's vest, found his comm, and immediately threw it on the floor. Han gave him a look.

"Who d'you think's gonna pick that up?" he asked gruffly.

Carlist smirked.

Lausta cleared her throat quietly, stepping forward, and Han turned to her, his face tightening. He nodded to her, his eyes falling sharply to the datapad in her hand. He had been waiting for the past few days for the final report on what the fuck had happened, and he didn't want to wait any longer. Leia thought he might be able to finally relax once he had some background, an explanation - a reason. At the same time, she doubted what Lausta and Carlist had to say would be satisfying.

These things...happened in political arenas. One was never universally loved.

Carlist folded his arms, his expression growing somber. Han stood at the edge of Leia's desk, allowing Max to meticulously pull at the flap of his vest pocket. Lausta moved around to stand next to Leia, nodding her head gravely, and then placed her holopad down and woke it up. A projection appeared, one of a middle aged man with a rugged face, thin lips, a broken nose, and dark hair. All in all, a rather ordinary looking being - human, unremarkable.

Leia suppressed a shudder, suddenly; there was something worse, she thought, about him being that ordinary.

Max hunched his shoulders and whined softly, and Leia hastily blanketed emotions. Han shot her a sharp look, and then glared back at the image.

"That's the guy?" he asked curtly.

He hadn't seen him at the venue. Security was quick to haul the body away, covered and obscured, and he had been busy trying to drag Leia off the stage, then furiously standing up with her when she refused to leave. He grit his teeth at the memory, anger simmering in his gut, and for a rare moment was glad that he wasn't connected with Max like she was, lest he pick up on it.

Except that wasn't quite true. Max eyed Han and shrank back a little; Han always forgot that even though he couldn't feel the babies like Leia could, they could feel him.

Han cleared his throat and rocked on his heels just slightly, soothing Max. It was Leia's turn to give him a sharp look, and Han lowered his head to touch his nose gently to Max's forehead, apologizing - but also thinking, just a little ruefully:_ tattletale. _

"That is _the guy_," Carlist confirmed, quoting Han's tone exactly. He gestured to the image distastefully. "His name is Raq Daxus. He's," Carlist paused, and rubbed his jaw.

"Nobody," Lausta finished shortly. "He's nobody."

Carlist folded his arms and grunted, his face sour and grim. Despite being a military official, he was closely involved with the investigation of what had happened because an attack on the Chief of State was considered a simultaneous political and military threat. He'd thrown his resources in with Lausta's to assist in the evaluation.

Leia surveyed them both critically. She shifted, tapping a fingertip on her desk.

"Nobody," she repeated coolly.

"There is no political nexus to this, Madam Chief," Lausta said in her even, logical way. "Not that we can find - and I highly doubt we have missed anything. As you well know, my team and I track threats to you very closely. We relentlessly monitor splinter groups, terrorist networks, old Imperial strongholds - the works," she explained. "We heard absolutely no chatter leading up to the attempt a few days ago and now, well - that rather makes sense."

"It makes sense?" Han asked edgily, narrowing his eyes. "It makes sense you missed something like this?"

"Han!" Leia interjected, her eyes widening. It was almost a gasp, and she hadn't expected herself to sound so shocked but she - she _was_. Han _knew_ Lausta; he knew she was beyond reproach, and so were the people she hired exclusively to deal with this sort of thing. It was entirely out of line for him to say such a thing. He knew good and well Lausta had been torn up enough.

Han rubbed Max's back, and fell silent. He inclined his head towards Lausta stiffly, and she merely put a hand to her heart.

"I can only offer my apologies again, General Solo," she said honestly. "We will do better in the future."

Irritation flared hot in Leia, though Han had the good grace to look fairly abashed at her gracious response. He tightened his jaw, and Leia shook her head, turning eyes full of meaning towards Lausta. Lausta looked back at her boldly, with the tacit request that they move on from the interruption.

"It makes sense," Carlist remarked, "because from what we can verify, it seems Daxus woke up one day and decided to shoot you."

Silence fell after his comment, and then, after a weighty moment, he went on.

"There were no grand plans. There was no political or economic objective. He didn't confide in an accomplice or send threats. He's not radicalized by an ideology, he just," Carlist paused, and shrugged, drumming fingertips on his arm. "It was personal. He hates you. Our federal policies have cleaned up a lot of the racism, social injustice, and corruption that men like him used to thrive amidst, and you represent the new way of doing things."

Leia compressed her lips. She nodded.

"Lone hounds are difficult to track," she noted.

"Yes," Lausta said stiffly. "Notoriously. Everything we do often depends on tips, established systems of threats, et cetera," she explained, though Leia sensed it was for Han's benefit. "It is difficult to see a threat coming when the threat does not tell a soul of his intention, and acts on an emotional whim."

Han shifted Max from one hip to the other, his brow dark.

"Yeah, but how's a guy with no backing, no sophisticated network...how's he get that close?" he demanded. "He got a blaster into the venue."

Lausta looked at Han quietly for a moment.

"As did you."

Han rocked on his heels.

"I'm married to the head of the fucking galaxy," he shot back. "I can take a blaster wherever I want."

Leia arched a brow, but said nothing for a moment. Then she sighed, and straightened up.

"It isn't uncommon to see armed citizens all throughout the core worlds," she murmured tiredly. "Han, you've openly carried a blaster for half of your life, and at no point did you draw it to randomly assassinate a politician," she pointed out. "That is the case for many - especially on densely populated, rough worlds," she paused, thinking about it, and then put a hand on her hip haggardly. "And we weren't - "

"Looking," Lausta finished, agreeing. "We had no intelligence on any possibility of an attack at the social gathering. We weren't _looking_."

Silence fell again, and Leia turned her head, her eyes falling on Max. Now, he was tugging on one of Han's buttons, just lightly enough so that it was in no danger of coming loose. He smirked, oblivious, his head tilted at that jaunty, funny angle, enjoying the voices of people familiar to him even if he didn't understand their words. She watched Han clasp his little hand gently. Her husband's knuckles were white, and so were the creases around his mouth and temples, and she slowly met his eyes, wondering if they both were thinking the same thing.

_How do you look for, prepare for, a threat that doesn't present itself until its nearly too late? _

Leia ground her teeth, looking back down, and then hit a button to hide the projection. She had no interest in looking at the man's face any longer. She looked back up coolly, and Lausta folded her hands in front of her.

"We have conducted complex investigations and scanned multiple analytics and can say with confidence that this appears to be an extremely isolated event," she said, offering reassurance. "There is no increased threat chatter towards you, no indication that resistance to your leadership is building, or rankling anyone more than the usual sort of thing. General Rieekan and I have concluded that you are safe."

Lausta shifted, setting her shoulders back firmly.

"It is also worth mentioning that public outrage at the assassin has yielded a spike in your popularity. The, ah...swiftness with which the attacker was...dispatched," Lausta said delicately, "is an impressive deterrent to would-be assassins," she pointed out, "as is Han, apparently."

Han gave her a cool look that seemed to imply she shouldn't be so surprised. Lausta gave him a knowing half-smile. Leia sighed. She brushed her knuckles under her chin and pursed her lips lightly, studying the sleeping holopad, and then flicking her eyes around her - Han, Max, Carlist, Lausta.

"This is it?" she asked. She licked her bottom lip. "You can say with full confidence there is no secondary threat?"

Lausta simply nodded, while Carlist offered a verbal agreement.

"We have also decided - and I suggested it," Lausta offered, "that we will not publish the assassins' name and motives and allow him to become some lurid focal point for imitators, fame-seekers, or others with violent notions. General Rieekan and I both think it best that the narrative, if you choose to address it officially, remain about you surviving, and your resilience, and not at all about..._him_."

Han gave a clipped nod at that.

"Our kids?" he asked. "You think our kids are safe? Nothing out there on them?" he checked.

"No chatter on any of the children," Lausta confirmed. She paused for a beat, and tilted her head. "Other than the usual rampant speculation concerning the little ones' names."

"Oh, what's the leading guess for Max, these days?" Leia asked lightly.

Carlist cleared his throat, apparently struggling with a laugh.

"Chewbacca," he said, deadpan.

Leia looked at him, lips parted.

"I-what?" she asked, brow furrowing. "They think we named our son Chewbacca?" she angled her body towards Han. "Han, the galaxy thinks we named our son Chewbacca."

Han gave her a grim, strained smile, cupped his hand over the back of Max's head, and turned away, ripping his eyes away from the file on her desk. Leia suppressed a sigh, and turned herself back to Lausta and Carlist, giving them a regretful wince. She trusted them not to take Han's mercurial attitude to heart; he likely saw this whole analysis not as a good thing, but as something more sinister, something worse.

She vehemently chose to let it confirm what she wanted to be true: that this was an isolated incident that was over, and they could move on, get over it. Get back to normal.

She inclined her head at Lausta, and then Carlist, and moved around her desk to walk them out.

"Thank you," she said warmly, handing Lausta's holopad over to her. "Carlist, I still have our operations planning meeting on the books for the end of this week, and Lausta," Leia paused to rest a hand on the other woman's shoulder, squeezing warmly, meeting her eyes with great sincerity. "Thank you," she said again, leaning closer just slightly, "and please...Han is just," she paused, but Lausta nodded in understanding. "He's scared," Leia said anyway, very quietly.

Lausta merely bowed her head in acceptance, and smiled. The two of them left, and Leia gave a wordless signal to Tavska to let the assistant know that she wanted her office undisturbed for the next half hour or so. She knew she had some engagements on the books for the last few hours of the day, but she wanted to see if Han had anything to say to her - or yell at her - and see if she could persuade him to go home, to start them on the track back to normal working days.

The people would see this whole thing as a mere blip, a glitch that was over, if they saw Han stop dogging his wife's footsteps at work, if they saw Leia going on, strong and firm, just as she had on that stage even in the face of the looming shadows.

Leia shut the door. She turned back to watch Han. He'd strode over to the window, and he was looking at it with cold interest. Leia considered chastising him again for how rude he'd been to Lausta, but decided it wasn't worth it. She sensed other emotions swirling in him - tensions, exhaustion - anger. Anger was common, lately, and she had never told him that when she sensed he was angry at her, it was a visceral, _painful_ feeling, like an aching head, or sharp needle sticks in her palms.

He suddenly turned towards her.

"This stuff in your office," he said gruffly. "It's ultra reinforced, right?" he asked critically. "The windows. Surge and laser resistant. Bolt proof?"

Leia nodded, anticipating his next question.

"Can we get that installed at home?"

She saw his mind working, saw him beating himself up for not thinking of such a thing before. She swallowed hard and was surprised to find that she wasn't opposed to the idea. The high ranking federal buildings were built with military grade technology that was usually uncommon in private homes but then again, the palace on Alderaan had been fortified; so were most embassies and aristocratic residences. Why not have their home protected? Why not keep her children as safe as possible?

"Yes," she said simply.

The satisfied relief on his face loosened some of the tightness in her chest. She strode over to her desk and sat on the front edge of it, folding her arms. She watched him quietly for a moment, and Max twisted towards her, stretching out a hand. Han strode over a little stiffly and handed her the baby. Max cooed smugly at Leia, grasping for an earring.

"Han," Leia said quietly, holding his gaze. "You're angry at me. Why are you so _angry_ at me?"

Emotions flitted across his face; he was indignant, wary, then stubborn, then innocent. He shifted his weight, hooking his thumbs into his belt. He'd taken to carrying his weapons belt again since the attempt, when he'd otherwise been more concealed about personal protection since becoming a father, and retired general.

She genuinely expected him to answer her, so when his response came, she was unprepared for it.

"Why do you _think_, Leia?"

She blinked, her shoulders stiffening. She bit the inside of her lip. The snap of a response rankled her, and she felt her hackles rise defensively. She hoisted Max higher on her hip, snuggling a thin shield of bliss over him so he'd be inured to sharper emotions. Only then did she respond, her eyes narrowing tensely at her husband.

"Your reaction to this, to _all_ of this," she said crisply, "has been _extreme_."

"_What_?" Han snapped. "My _reaction_ to - someone tried to - Leia!" he shook his head. "What about your reaction?" he hissed. "Your _lack of reaction_?"

Leia grit her teeth. Han's eyes flashed, and then he suddenly looked lost, and she shook her head again, stepping forward. He reached out to touch her, both of his hands sliding over her arms. She immediately twitched her arms, shaking his touch off. She did it without thinking, and then she looked down at her arm, almost as if she were taken aback by her own body's movements.

Han crossed his arms anxiously, swallowing hard, and that look on his face made her feel a little stifled, alarmed at herself. She turned her head to Max, pressing her lips together hard, and took a deep breath, soothing her own ruffled sensibilities, and kissing Max's forehead. She sighed.

"These things happen, Han," she said quietly. "It's...an occupational hazard. I'm okay. It's over."

Han said nothing, and she sighed again, leaning forward to hand him Max.

"Take him home," she suggested gently. "I won't work too late."

Han took Max, eyeing her intently. He shook his head, his voice dull when he responded:

"S'not okay, Leia. It's not."

He turned away while she watched him, and when he left her office tiredly a few moments later, his shoulders sagging, Leia felt tears welling up in her eyes unexpectedly. She touched her arms, closing her eyes tightly, and dug her tooth into her lip, composing herself - she didn't want to dwell on this, this, this thing - why couldn't he, too, just accept the close call, cling to the blessing of life and...put it behind him?

* * *

The _Falcon's_ private hangar was an expansive thing to behold, and in the years since Han and Leia had children, had become more than just a den of glory for the beloved old ship. Currently, it also housed several single occupant ships, a family speeder, and a state of the art, somewhat ostentatious speeder bike that Han had bought on a whim a few months after Max was born. There were training trikes, training speeders, junior holo-skates, one junior holo-board that Jaina had used for five minutes before spectacularly falling off - storage bins that contained helmets, goggles, and all kinds of tool-kits for repairing each of the items stored in the hangar, because even though they were more than capable of paying mechanics, Han still liked to do all of that work himself.

It kept him alert to the newest tech configurations, kept him from getting complacent - this sort of gritty, dirty, mechanical grunt work kept his mind sharp and focused and was, as Leia put it, his _thing_, the _thing_ he did to ensure they remained individual people who belonged to themselves and their passions, rather than utter devotees to their children.

It was at this sort of thing that Luke found him, when he went wandering into the hangar to look. The _Falcon's_ ramp was down, and faint noises occasionally emanated from it, indicating Chewbacca was probably messing around in its depths. Han, however, was at work on one of Leia's small personal ships. He was crammed, rather uncomfortably, it appeared, into her seat, the guts of the dash controls sprawled open in front of them, going at the wires with painstaking attention.

Luke slowed to a stop to watch for a moment, tucking his hands into his sleeves. He didn't want to abruptly interrupt, in case the work was fragile, and he knew Han would notice him eventually. His brother-in-law sat with a tight jaw and a furrowed brow, protective goggles fogging up slightly, a worried crease in his forehead - and after a moment, he drew back his lips in a snarl of concentration, that quickly compressed into a look of grim content, and he flicked his eyes over, setting aside one of his electrical tools and shoving his goggles up.

"Hey, kid," he greeted.

He eyed Luke for a moment, then turned back to his task, soldering the two pieces in his hand together with ease and beginning to poke things back into their rightful place. He picked up a drill, preparing to re-situate everything as it had been, and grunted slightly, lifting his chin as he worked.

"Though you were on Naboo," Han remarked. Luke was always on Naboo, these days, sweating and bleeding over the construction, physical and philosophical, of his new Jedi Temple. It was safe to say he permanently settled there, though Luke himself seemed hesitant to say that, and he and Mara both still disappeared on their galaxy-wide gallivants on occasion.

He began screwing the panels of the dashboard back in, the soft, determined _whirr _forcing Luke to speak loudly to be heard.

"I was," Luke said. He shrugged. "I watched someone take a shot at my sister, though. Seemed like a good excuse for a visit," he said dryly.

Han grimaced. He went at another screw with the drill, putting more force behind it than was necessary.

"Mara with you?" he asked, not acknowledging the other thing Luke had said.

Luke shook his head, waiting patiently for Han to finish up his business, kill the noise, and perhaps quit stalling. He relaxed his shoulders, effortlessly reading the emotions that swirled around Han - tension, anxiety, confusion, and a very mild, but simmering, anger. They were all things Leia had mentioned Han was projecting in droves, and they were things Luke had expected to feel coming from his sister, too - but eerily enough, she was blank. _Too blank,_ he thought warily, but no one was asking for his opinion.

Han finally killed the drill's power and sat back to examine his work. He gave a curt nod, and slung his legs out of the cramped, deep-set seat of the ship. Luke suppressed a smirk, a whisper of laughter in his voice when he next spoke.

"Why didn't you just scoot her seat back?" he asked, amused - Han was, after all, _much_ taller than Leia.

Han dropped out of the ship, smacking his hands together to shake off dust and debris. He gave Luke a wary look.

"'Cause she's got it set how she likes it, all perfect for her," he retorted. "You think I'm gonna mess it up? You think I want to _die_?" he asked dramatically.

Luke laughed.

"I can't imagine Leia would try to murder you over a slightly readjusted - "

Han blinked incredulously. He shook his head, amused - thing was, Leia could rarely ever afford to lose her cool over big things; _big things_, in government, or in parenting their children, required patience, logic, understanding, calm, diplomacy - all that. So, a new development for her - and him too, really - was that sometimes, they were both prone to go absolutely bantha shit over the most ridiculous little inconveniences.

Luke shrugged. He nodded at the ship.

"What were you doing to it?" he asked.

"Updating the anti-virus and the tamper resistance and alert software," Han grunted. He folded his arms tightly, and Luke noted that despite the privacy of the hangar, the familiarity of it, Han seemed alert and wary. "I did it for all our stuff," Han muttered. "Fitted the kids' stuff with more advanced threat deterrent shields, too."

He gave Luke a defiant look, as if expecting to be mocked for his aggressive protective measures, or chastised for his concern. Luke didn't see any reason to mock him at all; such a reaction seemed entirely reasonable considering the circumstances.

"How is Jaina doing with her rudimentary flying?" Luke asked instead. The training speeder was outfitted with wheels, and barely lifted off the ground at all, but Jaina was at the age that most children got behind their first 'ship' and started learning the basics. He knew it was a point of pride for Han that his oldest daughter had taken quite naturally to the concepts.

"Good," Han muttered. "'Cept she's banned from it right now 'cause a coupla days ago she flew it at Noura."

Luke arched his brows in amusement, but Han did not linger to tell what was likely to be an amusing story.

"You been by to see Leia?" Han demanded, eyeing Luke critically.

Luke blinked. He inclined his head.

"Yes, that was my first stop," he said mildly. He paused, then smiled a little. "As a matter of fact, I was surprised you weren't up there shadowing her, blaster drawn," he quipped.

Han just gave him a withering look, almost suspicious. He raised one hand slightly and pointed at him mulishly.

"What is it," he asked darkly, "with you and your sister and your _lah-dee-fuckin'-dah_ attitudes about this?"

Luke arched his eyebrows. He doused his smile and unfolded his arms, scratching his chin, choosing his next words carefully.

"I wasn't making light of it, Han," he said quietly. He shrugged. "I just thought you might be...inseparable, right now."

Han eyed him a moment, determining whether Luke was patronizing him or not, and then loosened up just a little, relaxing his clenched jaw.

"I _am_ concerned you used the phrase 'lah-dee-dah,'" Luke said after a moment.

Han glared at him.

"I put a 'fuck' in the middle of it," he muttered defensively.

Luke slowly let his grin return. He shrugged, shifting his weight and tilting his head up slightly to better study Han's face.

"Leia told me you were down here," he offered. "She was happy to see me but she seemed distracted."

"Yeah," Han said, glancing at a chrono on his wrist. He always wore one, now - a habit he'd started when he was deployed, and always keeping track of when a good time to call Leia would be. "It's the bedtime routine," he grunted. "Which is really just...trench warfare."

Luke snorted.

"But you aren't up there helping her," he observed.

Han pressed his palms to his chest in a deadpan imitation of shock.

"I'm _not_?" He lowered his hands, and grimaced. "You gonna give me a talkin' to?" he asked.

Luke shook his head.

"Good," Han went on bluntly. "'Cause I was helpin,'" he assured Luke, "but I keep...she told me," Han fumbled his words, reaching up to rub his forehead. "She says I'm stressin' them out too much," he forced out. "My," he stopped, and then waved a hand, obviously quoting Leia: "My feelings are bad."

Luke winced at the wording. He doubted Leia had said something like that and meant it to sound as damning as it did - as if Han's concerns and fears were invalid and problematic. She was no doubt busy and distracted herself, and needed to shoo him away for her own peace of mind to calm the children. Han glanced away from the look on Luke's face and shifted tensely, shrugging.

"My hovering," he said stiffly, "is suffocating her."

Luke folded his arms again, tucking his hands back into his sleeves sagely. He'd surmised as much, when Leia was sending him away, explaining in clipped sentences that he'd be of more use hanging out with Han, she just needed to get the babies to sleep, then they could catch up - everything was fine, Han was just shaken up and - she'd gone on, said more, but Luke was less focused on the words and more focused on the feelings. Things seemed...jagged; inharmonious.

He had hardly expected to find _strife_ \- or what almost amounted to it - between Han and Leia _now_. After...an attempt on her _life._

He pondered that a little, chewing on the inside of his lip lightly. Han's voice was a little bitter, but more than anything he seemed bewildered and hurt. Luke could understand why - with absolutely no Force ability of his own, Han struggled to understand the basics of the power. The intricacies were beyond him, and it was often difficult to explain without sounding condescending - or losing his attention.

"I'm not actin' weird around the kids," Han said abruptly, gnashing his teeth. "'M _not_. I haven't said anythin' about the...thing, and I haven't started lockin' them up. I put on the same brave face she does," he stopped, shaking his head. "But somehow, I'm makin' them all," he waved a hand grimly, "anxious."

Luke nodded, proceeding carefully.

"The little ones are...very discerning," he said slowly. "Especially Max. It's as if Max's sensitivity amplifies because of," Luke tapped his ear to indicate the hearing problem. "And Noura, she's very strong, and in one of her developmental leaps, and Jaina...I mean, she's Jaina, she's been around you longer, she's very attuned to you."

"I'm not - "

"_Outwardly_, you're not," Luke agreed, quick and pragmatic. "But Han you...don't have the ability to control what you're suppressing. Leia is using the Force to insulate her intangible emotions so they don't overwhelm the kids. You can't do that, so they can still pick up on your emotional undercurrents."

Han looked away sourly, his lips turning down darkly. That certainly didn't make him feel any better. It wasn't as if he walked into a room, and all three kids started screaming in horror, or whimpering and thrashing, or anything like that; Leia said it was just a heightened agitation, if he himself happened to be focused on how spooked he'd been, or how worried he was. He struggled with the silence for a moment, wistful, angrily wishing there was someway he could borrow that power, just for a little while, so he didn't scare or discomfort his kids.

He looked back at Luke.

"You think I seem...disturbed?" he asked warily.

Luke thought about it for a moment.

"No, I wouldn't say disturbed," he said honestly. He wrinkled his nose. "To be honest, Han, if it had to compare your - the vibe you're sort of...emanating it's...I dunno," he paused. "It's...similar to...when you were at Varykino."

Han blinked.

"Varykino?" he grunted, taken aback.

Luke nodded slowly.

"When you were fighting with Leia," he said cautiously. "All...confusion and anguish."

To his surprise, Han seemed to sag. He didn't so much relax as slump over, and he turned, rubbing the back of his neck and striding over to a cluttered work bench to sit down. He shoved some power tools aside and perched on the edge, gripping the bench with white knuckles and then leaning forward over his knees. He shook his head, brow furrowed.

"Anguish," he muttered to himself disdainfully, rolling his eyes.

Luke shuffled his feet and came closer. He leaned against the bumper of one of the speeders, eyeing Han calmly. Han rubbed both palms over his face and sighed. His sudden change in posture seemed to indicate that Luke had confirmed something for him, and it made Luke shift nervously. He frowned a little, and Han leaned up, interlacing his fingers and letting his hands hang between his knees.

"When you stopped by to see Leia," he began gruffly. "How'd she seem?" he asked. Then, without waiting for an answer, he went on: "I mean, y'know, to you. With your senses," he said, swaying his interlocked hands a little in a lazy gesture.

Luke considered the blankness he'd sensed in Leia. Not blankness as in a calm equilibrium, but more of a carefully maintained veneer. It wasn't unfamiliar and it wasn't necessarily a negative thing; it was a very Leia thing. He'd sensed it in her before. She often had to disarm her emotions entirely for negotiations, or to compartmentalize things until she could totally deal with them.

"Beneath the surface? She seemed pretty closed off," Luke said frankly.

One side of Han's mouth curved upwards ruefully.

"Yeah," he agreed. He looked down, and scuffed a heel on the ground. "Yeah."

His jaw ached, and a muscle in his temple throbbed.

"Somethin's wrong," he muttered. "She's...I dunno, kid. She's actin' like she used to."

Luke didn't ask for clarification.

"Well," he said gently. "She could be in shock. It's only been a few days. She might need to deal with the little fires at work, pertaining to the public, before she can take a breath," he suggested.

Han twitched his shoulders uncomfortably. Maybe, but he didn't think that totally explained it; that wasn't _all_ of it. Luke could sense her better in some ways, but he didn't live with her - he hadn't been through so much emotional development with her - he didn't know some things as intimately. Han could tell when Leia was withdrawing, and it was all the more startling _now _because she hadn't withdrawn in such a long time. He understood the concept of putting on a strong face to the public, but why the hell would Leia uphold the facade while at home; why would she act so callous, so dismissive of this incident? Was it really just shock?

She didn't quite seem shocked so much as...scornful. Of the whole thing - of the Media attention, of his fear, all of it. She kept saying this was over, this was a contained event, and seemed totally insensitive to the blinding reality of it, the horrible wake up call that Han had received. It was part of the job, an occupational hazard - _Oh, Han, people try to kill me all the time_ \- but that's what frustrated Han; they didn't really live violent lives anymore. No one _had_ tried to kill Leia in a long time.

She kept parroting that line automatically, and Han wanted to shake her, get on his knees and beg her to stop being so cavalier. So what if it was part and parcel of the job? That didn't mean he had to laugh it off, accept it as the norm. A peripheral, constant threat had become a real possibility for a lone moment there, and Han was struggling with it - wasn't she?

Was something else going on?

Han shook his head, lifting his hands, and resting his chin on them hard.

"She jumps when I touch her," he said, the words spilling out unintentionally.

He looked at Luke and then looked away, letting the words hang. He had been used to her doing that, once. He'd been vigilant about how and when he touched her, and slowly, over the years, that lingering trauma had faded, when it came to him. He was such a part of her life, she said, that she just stopped having that reaction to him, ever, even subconsciously. But now...it was back? Han clenched his jaw, shifting uncomfortably - was his concern for her that irritating, that suffocation? The thought made his mouth dry as cotton, made his throat ache.

"Maybe she hasn't processed it yet, Han," Luke suggested again. "It was a pretty jarring event that came out of nowhere. No one expected it."

Han grunted softly. His eyes narrowed as he thought about it. That, perhaps, was what was most coldly shocking, icy, horrifying, stunning - that the peace of their lives had been so comfortable, this seemed impossible to process. Perhaps once brushes with death had been exhilarating moments to laugh and joke about, howling over near-misses with other bloodied and embattled rebels, but life was different now. Han was sick at the thought of raising their kids without her. Surely she had to be just as petrified at the idea of missing out on that. Surely this had affected her, too, and it wasn't just him about to unravel at the seams - or was he just weak?

Did he need to accept that this was an isolated moment of terror, and it was done with?

He shook his head roughly, and looked up at Luke again.

"Yeah," he said roughly. "She's..yeah, maybe she needs a week or two," he muttered.

He doubted he sounded convincing - and he wasn't convinced himself, but he straightened up, clearing his through gruffly.

"You want to grab a drink?" he asked.

"Back at your place?" Luke asked.

Han shook his head.

"Nah, better not risk going back if she's still in the middle of bedtime. It would mess up the process," he snorted. "Some dive bar. Cantina," he flashed a grim smirk. "Old times."

"Wouldn't hurt for the scum of the galaxy to see Han Solo prowling the underworld again, eh?" joked Luke.

Han rubbed his thumb and forefinger together.

"Gotta remind 'em that higher status don't mean I got soft," he said coolly, "just means I can afford better weapons."

Luke snorted. He nodded, pushing away from the speeder he'd leaned on. Sharing a drink with Han seemed like a good way to get him to release some tension, which was one of the things Leia had snapped at him about when he'd dropped by earlier - _go, keep him company, see if you can get him to get over himself_ \- truth be told, Luke did wonder if Leia was being a little harsh, but then, she was often sensitive to being coddled. And whatever was going on, it was between them.

"How's Mara?" Han asked, slinging an arm around Luke's shoulders and steering him towards the door to the main hangar. Probably best if they hailed a ride service, rather than fly.

_Pregnant,_ Luke wanted to say, but he swallowed the answer, and refrained. He didn't feel the moment was right to share fluffy news such as that, and Mara would likely kill him, anyway. They hadn't planned the pregnancy, but they hadn't _not_ planned it, either. Mara was cautiously interested in the whole thing, and Luke was thrilled, but it was somewhat early on, and she didn't want people to know yet. She didn't want to be fawned over.

Instead, he gave some vague, noncommittal response. He asked Han to circle back to the story about Jaina trying to run Noura over with her training speeder, and Han snorted grimly, though his eyes glittered with at least a little suppressed amusement.

Relating the story, Han let himself be drawn into it, animated, because that had happened two days before some nobody got it into his head to take a shot at Leia and shatter the idyllic oasis Han's life had become; _that_ was a handful of days ago, when the most worrisome thing in their life had been Jaina's cutesy attempt at sororicide, Noura's discovery of the word "MINE," and Max's newfound ability to sling a bottle across the kitchen without touching it.

Han talked, and he tried to quash the creeping dread that shadowed his thoughts - he had been shaken, yes, but that was increasingly secondary to something else; he was capable of being grateful that Leia was alive and well and moving on, but something nagged him, some demon of the past, and some of his fear blossomed from that, blossomed from a prospect he was having difficulty confronting. It wasn't just anger, though he _was_ angry; he was so angry that she'd thought it more important to finish her speech than let her security team get her to safety until they figured this out - but his anger, of late, was mingled with the other thing; the bad thing that lurked.

The seconds that surrounded the sound of the blaster bolts were a horrid, murky blur to him; it was a traumatic moment that blacked itself from memory until he really thought about it, until he traced his actions, and saw them reflected back to them on the holos, and in the days since, he'd had more hindsight, a sharper sense of memory, and he could clearly hear her saying - _Han, let me up. Please. Get off of me_.

* * *

Han was not exactly exaggerating when he referred to the bedtime routine as trench warfare, and when he did it in her presence, Leia always gave a quiet, rueful laugh. It wasn't always easy, but it _was_ a routine, and even if it sometimes it was trying, and sometimes it went smoothly, it still existed as a stabilizing force in Leia's life. Barring some massive intergalactic emergency, she made it a clear point to be home and be a part of this particular routine. It was something she and Han did together whenever possible - wrangling three young children into bed was certainly no easy task - and her ordering him away tonight left her with a keen appreciation for all the times he _had_ done this by himself.

Though tonight the process was moving forward rather smoothly, and Leia was unsure if it was a fluke, or if the children could sense that there was an oddness to the whole thing. It _was _exceedingly rare for Han to be the one absent, though she hadn't been fighting with him per se. She'd just asked him to remove himself. He was stirring their emotions and _they_ didn't even realize where it was coming from. She felt _less_ guilty about it knowing that Luke was lurking around to keep him company, though guilt did still linger. Somewhere, deep in the back of her mind, a stern voice was berating her for being so callous towards Han, but at the forefront of her emotions was a constant, needling irritation at his inability to move past this - yes, it had only been a few days, but _she hadn't even been injured_, and she was doing her best to try and smooth through this without disturbing the kids, without letting it...debilitate them all.

There was no power in being Chief of State if it became obvious that the mere threat of an attack paralyzed her, cowed her, chased her into panicked obscurity.

Leia sighed, scraping her teeth along the inside of her lip lightly. She sauntered quietly back and forth between the cribs in Noura's room, eyeing the babies. Noura was still awake, eyeing Leia suspiciously, daring her to try and leave; she sat up in her crib, clutching the long, floppy ears of a stuffed toy, yawning occasionally, her lips puckered and pouty. Poor Noura, she wasn't just cute, she was beautiful, prettier than any child should be, and Leia almost hated it. It would be so hard to protect her - and Leia wasn't sure where those looks came from, anyway. Jaina was a clear amalgamation of herself and Han, alternately as stern and sharp as Leia, and as golden and sly as her father, but Noura had dark, dark hair and blue-golden eyes and when Leia had mentioned to Jobal that she must look a lot like Padme, Jobal's noncommittal response had indicated that the Naberrie clan probably thought, save for that dark hair, that Noura looked like Anakin.

Leia smiled at her, and drifted back to Max's crib, where he was already fast asleep on his back, legs and arms all comically flung out, mouth wide open. Every once in a while, he'd smack his lips or give a soft snore, but his mouth always fell open again. Leia leaned over his crib for a moment, watching him sleep, resisting the urge to rest her palm on his stomach or pick him up for just one more snuggle. It wasn't worth waking him. He had been difficult to coax to bed tonight, choosing to shriek and scream his head off for half an hour after his bath instead of submitting to a final snack and the rocking chair. Which of course had agitated Noura, because she was _overtired_, and put Jaina in a whiny, resentful mood.

Jaina, really, should be the first child to be attended to when it came to bedtime. She was the oldest, but at her age, she needed a set sleep schedule and to be taught to maintain good sleep habits. She was also usually the crankiest in the morning, and since she went to day programs and outings, she needed to be set up for success and well rested. Good sleep training was necessary for the babies too, but Max still didn't sleep through the night all the time, and Noura wasn't much older than him - she was usually up if he was, and they both still took naps throughout the day. They got plenty of sleep - Jaina didn't need to be up so late all the time.

But, inevitably, because she was capable of entertaining herself briefly if she could be persuaded to, she usually waited until her siblings were asleep. At least, on nights like tonight she did; when Han and Leia were both home, one of them took the babies, and one of them took Jaina. Tonight, Jaina had delighted in helping give Noura and Max their baths, and it had truly been an affectionate family moment, right up until Jaina thought it was amusing to dump a cup full of ice cold water over Noura's head.

Which led to Leia comforting a sobbing, half-swaddled Noura while she tried to discipline Jaina,_almost_ not noticing that Max had just pulled himself into a standing position in the tub and promptly flipped himself over the side of it. She caught him, of course; her senses flared immediately and she gently righted him, ordering him to sit back down - shaking her head all the while. She was in charge of the whole damn galaxy and she was barely, _barely_ able to keep her youngest baby from cracking his head open on the tile floor.

It was, if nothing else, a _little_ funny. Leia was dead serious when she told others that no job she'd ever done was harder than parenting.

Smiling at Max, and blowing him an airy, imaginary kiss, Leia turned and strolled quietly back towards Noura. Noura had flopped down, but was still staring at Leia moodily. Leia bent over the crib and reached down to stroke her dark hair.

"Night night, baby," she murmured, kind, but stern.

Tacitly, she warned Noura not to fuss when she left the room. It was _long_ past Jaina's turn for some attention. Noura's abhorrence of being left alone to sleep was relatively new, and even weirder since she shared the nursery with her brother. But she'd just recently, abruptly, started refusing to go to sleep unless one of her parents remained in the room. She'd often feign it, and then crack one eye open accusingly if she heard them trying to sneak out. Han didn't help the matter much, prone as he was to humoring her and then falling asleep in the rocking chair.

She turned to go, and reached the door before Noura sat bolt upright and glared at her.

"Mama, _no_," she snapped. "Stay."

"Noura," Leia replied gently.

Noura scowled at her. She flopped back down moodily and turned her back on Leia, and Leia sighed, creeping out of the room. She left the door open, listening sharply, but Noura was evidently going to cooperate tonight; she didn't start to whine or protest, and thus Max stayed peacefully asleep. Running a hand through her loose hair, Leia went down the hall to Jaina's room.

Her oldest daughter was perched in the little window seat, surrounded by pillows, very seriously showing Zozy the drawings in her favorite picture book. It was one of the few books that Jaina could read, and quite proudly, too. Han had taught her her letters when she was very young, smugly showing off how smart she was, and Yorev had taught her the basics of reading long before she'd started her day program. Jaina loved reading, and she picked up concepts and words easily, but Leia held off on fawning over her intelligence. The teenage years, she thought, were when she'd really find out if her kids had brains; all babies and young children were incredible sponges capable of magnificent intelligence, it just developed at different paces. That mental elasticity had to settle before she let herself have any bragging rights.

"Jaina," Leia said, cocking her head at the little bed in the corner.

Jaina sprang off the window seat and skipped over to her bed, climbing into it and settling down neatly. She patted her hand hard on the pillows next to her, waiting expectantly for Leia to come join her. Leia smiled, and clicked her tongue softly at Zozy.

"Go settle Noura," she told the Mooka, and he trotted off knowingly, either to curl on the rug next to her, or scale the crib bars and jump right up in there.

Jaina yanked a book out from under her pillow and presented it to Leia. It was an Alderaanian fairy-tale - not _Noura of the Castle Lands_, but rather a new one Rouge had given her for her last birthday. Jaina liked it to be read _in_ Alderaanian; she thought it was much prettier that way. She also loved it because it was the first time she'd been able to translate something by herself - once she'd learned the story in Alderaanian, she'd slowly, carefully, told it to her father in Basic.

Leia took it and sat down, snuggling up next to Jaina comfortably. The little girl tucked herself into Leia's side blithely, attentively looking at the pictures as Leia read. She yawned once, and occasionally plucked at the diamond ring on Leia's finger as she listened to the story, fiddling with it absently. She loved that ring. She'd already asked Leia if she could have it when she got married. Han had told her to worry about that when she was forty.

"...and so then," Leia read, finishing up the story, "Lady Ilyena signed the Articles of Freedom, and though it had not been an easy path, it was a righteous one. The," Leia closed the book very slowly, and very dramatically, "_end_."

She paused for a moment, and then looked down at Jaina.

"What was the meaning of the story?" she asked, as she always did when the read together.

Jaina looked up at her with wide eyes.

"You have to listen when other people say they are having a bad time even if you are not having a bad time," she said. "You should ask them to tell you why their time is bad and listen."

Leia bent to kiss the crown of Jaina's head, nodding.

"Very true," she murmured proudly. "And not just people, right? _All_ species."

Jaina nodded contently. She yawned.

"Maybe we can make Nor's name Ilyena now," she suggested.

Leia laughed.

"Noura's going to _stay_ Noura, babe," she said, shaking her head.

Jaina grumbled about it, but smiled, and shrugged. Leia set aside the book and stretched, settling Jaina down and getting up. She yawned herself, hiding it behind her hand, and watched Jaina burrow down in the covers, smacking her pillow to fluff it. She shoved her nose into it and closed her eyes, and Leia nodded approvingly - with any luck, she'd be asleep even as Leia tiptoed out of the room.

"Mama?" Jaina asked quietly.

So much for luck.

Leia turned, and Jaina peered at her warily over her blankets, which she had pulled up to her chin like a shield. She hesitated, and then covered her nose, and mumbled something.

"I can't hear you when you speak into your blankets," Leia said patiently.

"Can-you-come-sit-again-because-I-have-a-big-ask," Jaina said in a worried rush.

Furrowing her brow gently, Leia nodded. She returned to the bed and sat down lightly, leaning over to brush tendrils of Jaina's hair back. She smiled at her to encourage her, a tickle of worry in her chest. Had Jaina heard something somewhere? Was she scared...? She had seemed quite alright, her usual self, for the past few days.

"What is it, Jainy?" Leia asked.

Jaina took a deep breath. She stretched, began to yawn, clearly comforted by Leia's attentiveness.

"Is Daddy okay?" she asked through the yawn.

Leia's brow furrowed warily.

"Yes, of course," she said.

Jaina hummed. She rolled onto her side, and cracked one eye open, studying Leia pointedly. Leia tilted her head.

"Why?" Leia asked.

"Becaaauuuuse," Jaina drawled, mumbling. "He feels ummm...not. His heart goes too fast."

She put her hand against Leia's arm and began to pat it erratically, moving very fast.

"Like this. _Bum-bum-bum-bum-bum_! Really fast. For some days."

Leia nodded. She leaned down to kiss Jaina's forehead, choosing her words carefully. So Jaina was able to discern, and give voice to, the undercurrent of anxiety Han was accidentally projecting all over, even if he thought he was doing a good job of tampering it. She thought maybe it was only Noura and Max who were so badly affected, because at their age, they dealt more in subtly nuanced feeling than anything else.

"He's fine," Leia said firmly. "Something scared him recently, that's all. His heart beating fast, that's called anxiety," she explained. "It won't hurt him. It just makes him feel jittery."

That was the truth, as watered down as she could give it without completely dismissing Jaina's astute fears.

"Something scared Daddy?" Jaina piped curiously.

"Yes. Everyone gets scared sometimes," Leia said calmly.

Jaina blinked, almost skeptical.

"No," she said, frowning. "Not you and Daddy. Too brave."

"Well, being brave just means doing things even if you're scared," Leia said. "In fact, sometimes it's very stupid not to be afraid."

_Yeah, Sweetheart, maybe take a step back and listen to your own advice_ \- Han's voice growled out of her subconscious, and Leia blinked, pausing, cocking her head to the side. He hadn't - he hadn't said any such thing to her; was her own mind chastising her in her husband's voice, trying to force her to crack through her own hubris and face the facts of what had happened?

She thought of Han, angrily asking her - _Why do you _think_, Leia?_\- and she shook her head just a little, as if trying to get a little water out of her ears. She frowned, and the buttoned away the frown, giving an impassive look to Jaina. No need for her to start asking more questions, and worrying over something that she didn't have to.

Should she be more afraid? Was she actually terrified, and something was preventing her from connecting with it, feeling it, and -

Leia shook her head again. She bent to kiss Jaina one more time, smiled at her, and tucked her in. She left the room, rubbing her forehead with a tired sigh as she did so. Days. Yes, it had only been a few days, but it already felt like ages. She was tense, anxious herself, even, but Lausta had buttoned this up so quickly that the Media reruns of the attempted assassination footage were just gratuitous and counterproductive; she was trying to move on and get work done. She was trying to get her husband to move on.

Irritation spiked in her again and she tried to quell it. She knew her propensity for aggravation right now was unreasonable, and half the time she watched herself lash out at Han with disbelief. Why was she so mad at him for being frightened, and consequently, _why_ was he insisting on remaining angry at her - sure, she'd stayed and finished the speech, but it was time to get over that.

She stopped at the top of the stairs and instead of going down them, sat down on the top step and sighed, resting her arms on her knees, and her chin on her arms. Her children slept contently; she monitored their safe slumbers through her connection to them. The apartment hummed quietly, and a satisfied, homey aura surrounded her while she thought.

She gazed down the stairs, frowning vaguely.

_Should_ she be more afraid? Should she be as tense and anxious as Han? _Was_ she, without realizing it? She ground her teeth together. She kept coming back to the same thought: that this wasn't exactly a shocking turn of events. She had spent years under the gun, and Han had been right there in the trenches with her, with bounties almost as high on his head - there was no reason for this to unravel them, and so she logically refused to let it. She barely even remembered the exact moment itself; that morning, with all its carbon smells and hard stage floors and panic and chaos, was just a blurry nothing.

She needed to ease up on Han. She knew that. But she also needed them to get past this, and he was so...stuck.

She got up, and quietly made her way down the stairs and into the kitchen, idly pouring herself a small glass of wine. She felt tired, but she had no intention of going to bed until he came back up from their hangar. The last thing she wanted him to think was that she was coldly shutting him out, though something shadowy tugged at her heartstrings, faintly, and warily, warning that she was doing exactly that.

* * *

_-alexandra_


	4. Weeks Later

a/n: and now, the conclusion!

**tw: references to past sexual assault**

* * *

_Weeks Later_

* * *

Throughout the years, Leia had been so careful not to neglect her people. She had promised herself that no matter how immersed she became in the intricate mazes of intergalactic political power, she would remember the people who welcomed her in, the planet that sheltered her, and the culture that raised her. Alderaan would have remained her home and hearth no matter what, but of course since the physical destruction of the world, preservation of everything it had been was more important than ever. Even with the Haven open, and Rouge and Bail and Winter spearheading all sorts of social and economic initiatives, it grew more important every day to stay connected, to memorialize, to remain deeply involved with the Diaspora. A whole new generation of Alderaanian children were being born, children who came into the galaxy as refugees, who - like her own children - would never set foot on their parents' home world.

It was a difficult thing to grapple with, and sometimes, in its own way, it renewed the pain. But it also renewed the vigorous desire to safeguard traditions, language, and so many other relics of a martyred world that otherwise ran the risk of falling into myth. Though she may have, in the past, struggled with the pressures of royalty and the burdens that a princess, and a last princess at that, was required to carry, she cherished them, and no matter how busy she was with other things these days, working with the Alderaanian Council and working on Alderaanian issues never, ever felt like a hassle or added work.

It felt soothing, and it felt like coming home - and it especially felt so when she was working alongside her father. His presence was so constant and familiar now, and yet still, there would be moments when she looked up and was just utterly stunned at the miracle of his survival. That she had been given a second chance, that her father was able to be here in the flesh, to be a part of her _childrens_' lives...she was humbled by it.

Even if he was breathing down her neck lately in somewhat the same vein as Han. _Somewhat._ He didn't live with her, so it couldn't possibly be as overbearing, but it was a little...teeth-gritting. Though for what it was worth, he was keeping Rouge in check so Leia hadn't had to deal with _her _hysterics. And for that she would be forever grateful.

Leia generally set aside one full afternoon per week, unless she needed more, to devote entirely to Alderaanian issues. She was careful to remain as impartial as she could when acting as Chief of State, so if any of the duties conflicted, she usually deferred decisions to her Vice Counsels. It was always a relief to be able to step into her role as princess and be unabashedly biased in favor of her people - and as much as she liked her office at the federal building, she _loved_ her office at the Alderaanian Embassy. It was cozy, relaxing, well-lit - altogether gorgeous and relaxing.

This afternoon in particular the smog of the city was surprisingly thin, and the breeze was sunny and balmy, so Leia had the tall balcony doors thrown open while she and her father poured over work at the oak conference table in the middle of her office.

"This proposal," Bail said evenly, holding up a shimmering holodoc, "is for a line of children's clothes, Alderaanian styles of course, hand-maid with sustainable materials - very evocative of our culture. The grant request is very modest," he noted, eyes scanning over it.

They were in the midst of reviewing various proposals from members of the diaspora, and determining how they would assist in getting the appropriate permits, funds, and allowances for their people to move forward in the ways they wanted to establish their livelihood as they all continued to find places in this brave new galaxy.

Leia glanced up from the much more mundane papers she was going over, which were more focused on physical construction at the Haven, or education proposals. She swirled her finger and pointed at a document folder on the far right corner of the table.

"That should go to Rouge's portfolio," she murmured. She paused, and then leaned forward. "Actually," she murmured, reaching forward to take the doc from him. She scanned it, making note of the woman's name and contact information. She nodded. "Yes, Aunt Rouge," she said, "but I'll reach out to her, as well...if she has sample outfits ready, perhaps she can dress Jaina and we can get her some publicity, in a quiet sort of way."

"For what?" Bail asked curiously. "Jaina? A _publicity_ stunt?" he asked, alarmed.

He blinked, wide-eyed - he was no stranger to raising a child in the public eye,; he and Breha had paraded Leia around quite a lot, even when she was an infant. Leia and Han, however, had so far been adamantly against it.

"No, no," Leia murmured. "I only mean...among other children and parents. Her peers will be high profile, that's just a fact of life. Their parents may have interest."

Bail still looked a little confounded, and Leia arched a brow at him, amused.

"Dad," she said gently. "Jaina starts primary school in a few months."

Bail stared at her, incredulous. He felt the urge to blurt out that - well, that was _simply_ impossible; Jaina was a _baby_, she was..._oh_. She was five years old. He closed his mouth, shaking his head, and then frowned, concerned.

"But won't she be on the young side?" he asked worriedly. "Would you like her to be older than her classmates, not youngest?"

"_Han_ would," Leia conceded. "I don't see a reason to hold her back when she's eligible to begin with the next season, and she enjoys learning. She's flourished so much at her day program, and Yorev and Gareth do so much teaching in their own ways, I'd rather not be overly protective," she said, shrugging. "If we wait, and then she's too far ahead intellectually, I worry she'll get into a habit of acting out because she's bored. Jaina _needs_ to learn."

Leia set aside the fashion proposal.

"And," she added, arching an eyebrow. "It will make things easier on Han, regardless of what he thinks," she added, almost under her breath. "Jaina is just too much older than the little ones. It's exhausting."

Bail eyed Leia warily, hardly missing the subtle note of irritation in Leia's voice when she mentioned Han.

"I see," Bail said carefully. "And you say Han wants to keep her back."

Leia snorted.

"It's funny, isn't it?" she remarked mildly. "He's such a tough guy and had such a tough upbringing, but when it comes to the kids," she shook her head. Her lips turned up at the corner. "I shouldn't disparage it, though," she said honestly. "He's an incredible father."

Bail sat back, reaching behind him, and upwards, to stretch out his shoulders. He lowered his arms, taking a pitcher from the center of the table and pouring himself a glass of water, and then he peered at Leia over it, arching one brow.

"Have you considered, perhaps, that Han is wary of sending her to school right now because he's still shaken up over - "

Leia gave a terse sigh, her nostrils flaring, and shot her father a look. Her lips compressed tightly and the bridge of her nose wrinkled into a pinched, harassed expression.

"Han's protective all the time," she muttered curtly. She shook her head, continuing mostly under her breath: "If he is going to refuse to send them to school because of one _tiny_ incident...I will lose my mind," she paused, tapping along some files with a stylus, "that man..._kriff_..."

Her father watched her, a little amused at the mumbled rant. The words turned to unintelligible grumbling, and he watched how tense she became. He'd been working more closely with her recently, bothered himself by such a close call - after all, he had certainly dealt with death threats against her before, and against himself and Breha, but his only experience with it in reality was when she was originally captured, and presumed dead, prior to the Battle of Yavin. All of her close calls - the ones she liked to reference and blow off - during the war existed as myths, for him. This was real. He had been rattled enough merely watching it from a different location; he imagined it was worse for Han.

"I don't know if _tiny_ is a fair description," Bail said after a moment.

Leia dropped her stylus crisply and looked up at him, narrowing her eyes.

"You too?" she asked.

She glared at him for a moment, and then sat back, rubbing her hands over her face. She grit her teeth, resisting the urge to scream - _let it go, let it go, why can't everyone just let this damn thing go? _More than a week had passed - it was coming up on a month, and Han was still...was she the only one who could retain her grip on sanity in the face of danger? Had everyone around her gone soft just because the war years had -

She bit her lip, and lowered her hands, tilting her head far to the side and looking at her father as calmly as possible.

"Things have been quiet since then," she said tiredly. "My approval ratings spiked, there is no additional chatter...this one lone threat is dead and gone." She held up her arms, waving them lazily. "I wasn't even touched. You know," she noted, her jaw tightening, "the roughest treatment I got during the whole damn ordeal was _Han's_ spectacular reenactment of the Hoth ice wall tumbling down on me."

Her tone was bitingly sarcastic, and Bail looked at her dubiously, one eyebrow ticking up slightly. Leia waved one hand halfheartedly and looked away.

"Never mind," she murmured.

She reached up and rubbed her shoulder absently.

"It is astonishing to me," she said after a moment, rather coldly, "that you - he - seem incapable of...moving on. He's still stressing Jaina out," Leia noted, her brow darkening. "Which is," she trailed off, flicking her eyes down.

"Which is what?" Bail asked.

Leia sighed harshly.

"I haven't yet...been in a position where I feel that I need to take sides between my husband and my children, but seeing Jaina so anxious and scared, even if she tucks it away, is very alienating, it makes me feel _angry_ when I'm around Han, and I don't...like that," she said.

Her voice was flat, and after a moment, she shrugged.

"I just need him to get over it."

Her father raised his eyebrows, and leaned forward on the desk, resting his arms on it heavily.

"Leia," he said in a sharp, fatherly voice.

She looked at him in surprise, her lips pursing.

"Don't you think you're being rather cruel?" Bail asked bluntly.

Her eyes flashed angrily. She grit her teeth, immediately on the defensive, and resentment bloomed in her chest. She lifted her chin defiantly.

"Cruel?" she repeated, almost in disbelief. "That's a strong accusation."

"It's not an accusation," Bail said. "I'm asking you to consider it," he admonished.

"You think I'm being _cruel_ to Han?" Leia demanded, skeptical.

Bail sighed. He interlaced his fingers on the table. All things considered, he thought both of them were acting disturbed. Han certainly had seemed damn near catatonic for the first few days after the attempt, and he'd been angry with Leia for staying for that speech - that much was obvious. Bail could concede that, possibly, Han had gone a bit overboard, and needed some sort of snap-out-of-it moment. But Leia was perhaps the complete opposite. Strength and bravery were one thing, but Leia's dismissive, caustic irritation at everyone's concern strongly indicated repression, and in Bail's opinion, _not_ healthy coping.

When he had first returned from the nothingness he was trapped in for so long, he'd had to learn - from Han, mostly - the sort of behavior Leia engaged in when she was processing - or failing to process - trauma. And he'd endeavored to learn that very well, so he could be sensitive to it. He was willing to bet Leia was much less at ease than she was letting on - and Han likely knew that.

Leia leaned forward.

"_Why do you think that_?" she asked sharply.

"Well, to be honest, Leia, I don't think it's unreasonable for Han to be scared! He loves you. He doesn't want to lose you."

"Of course it's not unreasonable for him to be scared," Leia said. "But time has passed," she pointed out again. "This is...absurd, and Han...I've told you before; I've told you - Han _doesn't_ crack. This isn't...he doesn't get broken like this. _I_ do," she admitted frankly, "and if _I'm_ fine - "

"Oh, for Sith's sake, Leia Amidala, you are not fine," Bail interrupted sternly.

His face was suddenly very much a father's face; stern and probing, and warning her that backtalk was not going to be tolerated. Conditioned to that look from her teenage years, she widened her eyes a little and sat back as if she'd been pushed, eyeing him. She licked her lips, and then frowned hesitantly.

"Father," she began, trying to make her voice level and kind, "I do not welcome assassination attempts, but it isn't a paradigm shattering _thing_ for someone to try to kill me. This happens - "

"All the time?" he father finished, quoting her. "No, it doesn't," he said flatly. "The galaxy has been at peace since before Jaina was born. Transitions of power have taken place without bloodshed. The military barely takes casualties, even in Wild Space and the Reaches. The Cartels are curbed fairly well, and even the Imperial Remnant has trouble making noise. No one has tried to kill you, or even realistically threatened to, since before your children were born, and you were just reminded in front of thousands of people that you are not invincible. And that someone might take away your chance to see your babies grow up. Not to mention, as you pointed out, Han rather violently slammed you into the ground and pinned you there which is a far sight worse than someone sneaking up on you, and I seem to recall you do not react well to that. Violence is not the norm for you anymore. Post-traumatic stress disorder heals, but you can relapse, Leia - and besides, why would you let yourself be irritated at Han for coming up against something that 'cracks' him?"

Bail shook his head, using her words with derision.

"Because he's a man, and he should be stronger?"

Leia looked aghast.

"Of course not," she said hastily. "That isn't what I meant."

"I have to admit, Lelila, this is a failure on your part. It's failure that after all this time, I suddenly have to knock some sense in you and ask you to examine your own behavior, which may be just as problematic as Han's," Bail said firmly. "You've been married for - nearly ten years, is it? You shouldn't need me to point out that you are misdirecting your own fear - and I think you're very scared - at your husband."

Leia stared at him. An intervening thought rocketed through her mind - _ten years; have I been married ten years? _She swallowed hard, immediately looking down at the cluttered table full of their abandoned work. Had Han been talking to her father? She didn't think so. Shamefully, it seemed like Bail had simply observed this for himself. She clenched her teeth, reaching out to the Force to soothe herself, and without thinking, nudged a little mental block back into place, and then cringed - _fuck. _

When she spoke again, all that came out was:

"Eight and a half."

Her father sniffed.

"Fine, eight and a half years of marriage. Then factor in all the time you are always so adamant was vital to your relationship - Hoth, Bespin, those years you were together that I missed - and ask yourself what's really going on here. _Listen_ to your complaints. You are - you are _bitching_ because your husband is scared to lose you."

Leia put a hand to her forehead and peered at him stonily.

"Bitching?" she mouthed at him, startled.

He looked back at her pointedly, and folded his arms. He studied her, for a long time - until she felt like squirming - and then he sighed, and his shoulders slumped.

"Leia," he began, quieter; more diplomatic. "Have you watched the footage?"

She blinked at him, and pursed her lips.

"It's ubiquitous," she said. "Half the problem is the insistence on constantly showing - "

"That is not what I asked. Have you sat down and watched the footage?"

She fell silent, staring at him guardedly. Her instinct was to say yes, of course she had; after all, it _was_ everywhere. But as she considered it...she could not in good faith say she had. She had _lived_ it, but it was a blur. The moment, when she really got down to it, was black - a suffocating moment. It boiled down to her confusion, and her...how confined she had felt. She rejected the memory, and that created a dangerous block inside her, because...because it had been _Han_, and Han would never hurt her. She didn't want to think about it.

"Watch it," Bail said gently.

He pushed his seat back, gathering most of his things.

"Watch the footage, now that some time has passed. Watch it as a spectator. And go home, Leia. Take some days off."

Holding his things in his arms, he sighed, and came around to kiss the top of her head gently.

"Take _care_ of yourself," he advised, his last words, before abruptly leaving her alone.

She turned, taken aback at his sudden decision to end their work, and watched him slip out of her office. She swiveled back around, staring blankly at the mess of documents before her, her gaze unfocused. She licked her lips, considering what he had said; nitpicking exactly _why_ she was so prone to irritation towards Han. Because her father was right; it was ridiculous to treat Han poorly because he was upset. And he was...he was right again, she supposed - this fleeting act of violence was an outlier in their lives.

She pushed her things to the middle of the table and got up, strolling over to her desk. She sat tensely on the edge of it, flicked on her Holo, and skimmed through options to pull up a live broadcast of what had happened at that venue, relenting to her father's advice. She pulled up a frozen image, and then, after a quiet, internal sigh, she played it.

She watched herself take the stage. She watched herself begin her speech. The crowd was attentive. Han sat in the front row, lounging provocatively, his clothing wrinkled. The Holo panned back to her, and she saw Lausta suddenly step up beside her, snatch her blaster into her hand, and fire directly into the back of the crowd. Almost simultaneously, a second blaster crack sounded, and a bolt soared above Leia's head and pierced the banners behind her. Lausta had been so fast that the assasins' shot had been a sympathetic jerk.

Leia swallowed hard, and rewound the clip, this time watching Han. She watched him sit up as soon as he saw Lausta step forward and draw. He launched himself out of his seat, sending his chair sprawling, and vaulted onto the stage. He landed roughly on his knees, and his hand flung out, catching her at the shin. He dragged her down, managing to slip his arm under her head so she wouldn't crack it on the raised platform, and as the rest of Leia's security agents flooded the stage, Han tucked himself over her, covering her completely.

He was so much bigger than her.

She watched, her spine freezing. That was all she remembered. She realized now..._all_ she remembered was the smell of carbon, the horrible cracking noise, and Han, pinning her down so hard that all she could think about was how trapped she was. And watching it now, she knew, with complete clarity, why she had re-actively erased this from her mind. Shut it down so completely that she had to witness it to remember it. She was protecting herself. She was protecting herself, and Han, because she didn't want to feel alienated from him, or let him find out about it, and she wasn't even doing a good job of repressing it.

She looked away from the screen, remembering all the times she'd jumped away from Han in distraction, or warily rolled away in bed, over the past few weeks. It didn't help that Han was likely angry at her for his own reasons.

She reached up to push her hair back, and bit her lip. She killed the power on the Holo, closed her eyes, and took a deep breath. This would stop _now_. She'd talk to him tonight, and this would be...this would be healed; it would really be over. Han did not deserve the way she'd been acting, and she had come too far - much too far - over the years to undo so much of her own personal progress as far as trauma went. What he _did_ deserve was to know why she'd shut down, now that she'd taken a moment to honestly acknowledge it - and she knew how much it would hurt him. She didn't want to hurt him; that was almost always the root of her feelings sometimes - but she also had tools at her disposal now to soother herself, to repair any unintentional harm done.

She took a deep breath, locked her office, closed the balcony doors, and sat down on the floor behind her desk; she closed her eyes calmly, and reached for the Force, letting it cocoon her, relaxing, confidently, into meditation.

* * *

It was with a weight lifted that Leia joined Han in bed that evening. A weight she hadn't known – or rather refused to acknowledge – she'd been carrying. Gone was any underlying wariness of Han's touch, or resentment of his strong emotions and present, instead, was a desperate desire to repair the damage she had wrought, not by virtue of trauma resurgence, but by allowing herself to regress into the coping mechanisms of the past.

She let herself stay up much later than usual, putting the finishing touches on some work, as she'd decided she was not going in for the next few days unless the galaxy absolutely and utterly imploded on itself.

When she'd asked her Vice Counsels to cover for her, they had agreed with grace, and when she told her father she'd be unavailable to the Alderaanian Council as well, his tone betrayed nothing in response, except perhaps the barest hint of satisfaction.

Tavska was pleased, Lausta was relieved, and Carlist was thrilled. All that was left was to appease her husband.

And because she'd been up so late, she was sure the children were deep in their little worlds of unique dreams, thus giving her a better chance of spending some uninterrupted time with Han. She checked on each of them before bed, careful not to make any noise, looking without touching, and then retreated to the master bedroom with a cooling mug of tea and a feeling of determination.

Han was already there, freshly showered and sprawled out on his stomach on his side of the bed. She left the door cracked just a little, in case Zozy left the nursery in the middle of the night, and crept over to her side of the bed. She slipped in between the sheets with him, pulling a loosely braided rope of hair over her shoulder.

He stirred and looked up at her lazily, his expression guarded. His eyes were soft but searching, wondering what sort of mood she was in, and she took a moment to appreciate how sweet it was that he very rarely went to sleep before her, no matter how tired he was. He always wanted to make sure she was in bed, getting her rest.

Something about her look must have caught his eye, because he pushed himself up, blinking a few times, and alert.

She blew softly on her tea and then took a long sip, swallowing hard.

"Han," she began without preamble. "I want to talk about it."

Han studied her, his hair sticking up at comical, odd angles, his eyes sharpening even more. A muscle in his temple twitched, and he flexed his jaw just slightly, treading carefully.

"Talk," he repeated. "About…?"

"You have to ask?"

"Think you ought to have to say it," he said flatly.

Leia turned towards him a little more, considering her tea with a light flush. She bit her lip, nodding, and then sighed, sitting back. She took another sip.

"I want to talk about the fact that someone tried to kill me a few weeks ago," she acquiesced.

Han ran a hand through his hair and sat up. He rubbed his face, shoving a pillow down towards his lower back for better support, and nodded fervently.

"Yeah," he said heavily. "So do I."

Leia compressed her lips, and cupped her mug lightly, balancing it in her lap. Again, she stared down at the liquid, watching it swirl and calmly steam. She enjoyed the scent and the calming, very subtle floral taste. After another moment of silence, she breathed out steadily, and lifted her chin.

"I know you've been angry with me, Han," she said, keeping her voice soft. Her throat tightened up a little, and she was angry with herself, but she held it together, and gazed at the side of his face earnestly. "I understand…why. I know I've been," she paused, and then decided to use her father's honest words, "cruel."

Han looked at her quickly, his brow knitting just a bit. He frowned, and cocked his head.

"No," he said seriously, though slowly. "You've been…you. The old you."

He paused, grimacing, and then his face tightened a little.

"I been so used to not seein' that part for so long, I didn't recognize it," he muttered.

"It's a me that still exists, in here," she said, putting one hand lightly to her heart. She swallowed hard. "She just…woke up."

Han snorted quietly, sighing. He leaned back, his shoulders hunched, and stared down his torso, looking off at nothing, waiting for her to go on.

"Han," she started again, her voice softening even more. She winced, licking her lips. "There's a lot to it," she said. "I need to tell you what made it so," she paused, resisting the urge to shudder, "so like _this._ And I don't want to."

Han turned his head to the side, and she watched his jaw tense in a dark grimace, almost as if he could guess. It looked like he closed his eyes.

"I would rather never talk about this," Leia said. "I know you don't want to hear it. And I know we can't ignore it."

"Yeah," Han said huskily. He still wasn't looking at her. "S'okay, Leia," he said, an edge of boldness forced into his tone. "You can tell me. S'okay."

She looked down at her tea again, reaching up to rub her shoulder with one hand. She scraped her bottom lip with her teeth for a few seconds, steeling her soul.

"You pinned me down, Han," she said finally, putting it there in the open for them both, shining light on the shadow. "You pinned me…and I couldn't get up."

She closed her eyes tightly, breathing in once, and out again. She had already had this conversation. She'd had it while she meditated. She'd had it with herself, when she revisited the memory in the intangible web of the Force, and she'd set it right – soothed herself, calmed herself, disconnected the crushing horror of it from Han, and his good heart, and his desperate, protective intentions.

Still she knew –

She had expected Han to hurt, but she was unprepared for his immediate reaction. He nodded once, curtly, as if he knew exactly what she was going to say, and then he made an abrupt, startling noise and hunched forward, tucking his head into his knees and grabbing the back of his hair in a fist. He shattered immediately, breaking in half before her eyes, shocking her so that she barely avoided sloshing her tea. Her heart raced frantically, and she hurried to set the mug aside, reaching out to him with comforting palms and a brave, brave face.

She held her tongue, listening to him, and the sound of that first, initial cry of anguish strangling her heart. He'd muffled it quickly, burying his face in his legs, but he either couldn't – or wouldn't – hide his violently shaking shoulders. She'd seen Han cry before, but it was never like _this;_ never so raw and devastated.

Leia rested her palms on him tenderly, loosening his tangled fingers from his hair, stroking it down soothingly and then rubbing his neck and shoulders.

"Han," she whispered, pressing her lips to his ear. "Han. Listen to me," she coaxed. "Han," she kissed the back of his neck. "Honey. It's okay. You don't have to hurt this much."

He finally, _finally_ lifted his head. His face was pale, his eyes bloodshot, and it looked like it took an effort to meet her eyes. He shook his head roughly, trying to claw at his hair again. Leia held his hand, her heart fluttering hard.

"Okay?" he repeated huskily. "Leia, it's not…I knew it, I started to think," he rambled, shaking his head. Her words from that day echoed in his ears. "I was so pissed off about everythin' else, and then I thought," he trailed off again, swallowing hard.

He'd wondered, and then he'd dreaded, and now he knew. He knew, and he'd never forgive himself.

Her fingers brushed delicately down his neck, and he shivered, his jaw aching. He swallowed hard again, trying to force himself to get a grip, but his eyes stung and his throat burned. He groaned softly.

"This's my worst fuckin' nightmare, Sweetheart," he said hoarsely. "I can't live with this. Knowin' that I…brought all that back up? Me?"

"You didn't do anything wrong," Leia said firmly, her voice whispering into his ear. "Listen to me, Han," she said again. "I am finally talking about it."

He looked at her, haggard.

"That night, we came home," he said, strained. "I was all over you. I was _clawing_ at you, in the shower, up against the wall…I went at you like an animal," he looked at her with wide, horrified eyes. "Did I not hear you tell me no?"

"I didn't tell you no."

"Did you want me to stop? Did I hurt – "

"Han, Han," she interrupted again, keeping her voice that same soft whisper, musical and warm but firm. "Han. You weren't hurting me. I never told you to stop," she assured him. "I," she shrugged, helpless. "That day is a blur, Han. I repressed it. I was terrified. I examined that night and I don't have any negative associations with the sex we had."

His eyes bore into hers, pleading, uncertain – disbelieving.

"How can you not hate me after I threw you to the fucking ground and – "

"I don't know," she answered softly, breaking in firmly before he could berate himself again. "I don't know. I've told you what happened after I saw Alderaan destroyed. I went to sleep."

She went silent for a moment, because she and never told him this next part. It had just never seemed important.

"After I was raped, all I did was ask for a glass of water," she whispered hoarsely. "I don't know how it works. Trauma is too complex and I'm not a professional. You've been right there with me when it hits for _no_ reason. The first time I slept with you, I thought of nothing but you, but you were also there when I couldn't _breathe_ in that 'fresher on the way to Bespin."

She licked her lips.

"It hardened and _settled_ and maybe…maybe I was so scared I had to find something else to fixate on. That is the worst part about these wounds, Han. They just ache sometimes. When they haven't ached in ages."

Han leaned back heavily. She still held onto him, and his body pressed into her arms. He tilted his head, looking up at the canopy of their bed hollowly. He was silent as the grave, his expression heavy. He took a deep breath.

"You were scared?" he asked.

Her eyes filled with tears.

"Honey, I was so scared," she whispered, surprising herself.

He turned towards her earnestly and wrapped his arms around her, letting her tumble herself against his chest. He was careful, so careful, not to hold her too tightly, and she grasped at his elbows, pulling on him tightly.

"My father is _right_. Violence hasn't been part of our reality for _years_," she whispered, tears slipping down her cheeks and onto his chest. "I've been safe. We have been safe. And that attempt came so close…I think about my babies never seeing me again, _never_ understanding why they lost me, and I can't think straight. _I can't breathe_."

Han nodded, pressing his nose hard into her hair.

"I know," he said fiercely. "I know. What'm I s'pose to do without you to help me? I need you, Leia. I need you, and I need _them_ to have you. Kriff," he swore hoarsely.

He drew back, touching her face gingerly.

"You know how angry I was?" he asked, swallowing hard. "You wouldn't come in off that stage and I…it felt like you just drove a blade in my gut," he said bluntly. "Like you didn't give a damn if someone put a bolt through your skull on a live broadcast. Like you didn't care that I'd have to be the one to tell the kids why you weren't coming home."

He cleared his throat hard, his fingers still brushing her face carefully.

"I didn't even _think_ about…about how I tackled you," he broke off.

She touched his wrist, and then squeezed it fiercely.

"I'm sorry," she told him, holding his gaze sincerely. "I am _sorry_, Han."

She took a deep breath, and let it out slowly.

"I am sorry I put you through what I did, staying out there. You, and Jaina, and Noura, and Max are the most important things in my life. I made it seem like my image mattered more. My head was all messed up," she said, her voice cracking, "and I'm still so sorry."

He ran his hand back through her hair, cupping the back of her head in his palm. He made a hoarse _shushing_ noise, as if it didn't matter, and then he tugged her closer again, wrapping his arms around her. Leia relaxed in his grasp, embracing the safety and comfort his arms once again provided.

It felt like an eternity had passed when she finally drew back, wiping her face and facing him with a raw, open expression, her arm under her head. He stared back, pressing close to her, giving her just enough space. He watched her throat move, watched her jaw relax, and she looked at him through her lashes.

"Is there anything you need to say to me?" she asked. "To make me understand how angry you've been?"

He rubbed his forehead with is knuckles and shook his head.

"Han, if you need to tell me a hard truth…I just told you one. This is a two way conversation."

He looked reluctant for a moment, and then he just sighed, looking down heavily.

"I wanted to ask you how the fuck you could do that, just stand up there like nothing had happened. I wanted to scream at you, Leia, and keep screamin', about how _dare_ you take that risk. Max and Noura… they wouldn't even _r'member_ you," he said helplessly. "I'd have to do it all myself and I'd never be the same. I'd never fuckin' recover if I lost you."

He licked his lips, and shrugged.

"Seems selfish. You weren't tryin' to spite me."

"I let myself get sucked in to that viciousness again," Leia said huskily. "I let myself turn to ice, and shut you out, like I haven't done in years."

She bit her lip hard enough to draw blood.

"Because of this stranger. This vile – this _despicable_, violent –_nobody_—"

Han touched the drop of blood, and wiped it away with his thumb.

"And I didn't recognize it," he said dully. "I just got pissed."

He felt silent, and then brushed his knuckles over her cheek.

"You're warm now, Sweetheart," he said. "It's all over."

"I've been trying to make myself believe that for weeks," she whispered, her voice breaking.

"I know."

He leaned forward to press his forehead to hers, and such a feeling of relief rushed through him. It cleansed like a river, forcing away the rot and decay of the past few weeks, offering clarity even along with the ache of knowing he'd dredged up her trauma, however unintentional it had been.

She breathed in and out so steadily, and when he felt ready enough, he cleared his throat, and asked –

"You said…you examined that night? For negative stuff?" he asked gruffly. "What's that mean?"

Leia's eyes drifted open, and she looked at him silently for a long time. Then she sat up and crossed her legs nimbly, remaining close, and looking down at him. She touched the ends of her braid, and then fidgeted with the sheets, watching him through her lashes.

"Do you remember," she asked faintly, "the very first time I mediated with Luke?"

Han gave her a withering look that was almost comical, and said nothing – of course he remembered; as if he would ever forget the kid showing up with a bleeding, dazed Leia, dumping her on him when he was already entertaining the last Viceroy of Alderaan.

Leia smiled wanly.

"He taught me how to take back memories. To…filter out the corruption. Return things Vader had ruined to their original state. I stay away from altering techniques," she said. "I am afraid I would be too tempted to erase my own memories and I…am who I am, and erasing the worst would destabilize me in ways I can't predict. I don't think it would be healthy. I think it would damage the fabric of my reality."

Han watched her, listening, but wary.

"For you, for that moment…I used that technique," she said.

She swallowed, and then held her hands up to animate her words, painting an invisible picture.

"You are…_you_, Han. You never hurt me. You never…you are just the safest, steadiest thing in my life. You're sacred," she whispered. "I went back to that moment and I made myself accept and acknowledge the fear, but I obliterated all connections between you holding me down, and anything else. I set it right. There is only _you_ there, now. You, keeping me safe."

Han grunted warily, and then took a long, deep breath. He let it out, and for a moment the lines on his face seemed too pronounced; he looked so much older than he was. And then that aching expression was gone, and he accepted her words, and he gave a cautious, slow nod.

"I didn't even think, Leia," he said. "It was just," he shrugged. "Instinct. I couldn't…I had to do something." He hesitated, and then looked down. "If this ever," he paused, his expression grim and nauseated, "happens again, I'll – "

"You'd do the same thing," she said gently. "It _is_ instinct. And…Han, it's what Lausta, or one of the others, would have done, too."

She licked her lips, and tilted her head, eyeing him thoughtfully.

"It needs to be worked on. I need to speak with Lausta about my past. She can train to it," she noted confidently. "We can utilize," she paused, her lips quirking up a little, "a safe word, so to speak; a shout for me to associate with a trusted person acting on a security function – ahhh, _tackling_ me, in other words."

Han frowned.

"You sure you want to do that, Sweetheart?" he asked.

She lifted her shoulders, and then nodded brazenly. She bit at her bottom lip for a moment, and then she smiled almost spitefully, her eyes flashing.

"It's too on the nose," she said bitterly.

His brow furrowed.

"What?"

"This…miserable son of a bitch," she hissed coldly, "pulls a _physical_ trigger and it," she waved her hand at her heart, waving her fingers tiredly, "shakes them all loose, these old, buried pieces. These triggers."

Han put his hand on her knee.

"Both of us just…saw red. We had the veneer scuffed. It's like we could suddenly glimpse the horrors we lived through, like they might be coming back for us, or for – "

"The kids."

She nodded at him.

"Yes," she whispered.

She was struck with horror at the idea of her children ever fighting the battles they had fought. She lived with the dread that they would be roughed up, ruined, or made to cry. She knew life was life, and they would have their own ups and downs, but all she asked was that her babies, her three innocents, never know what Han had known, and never suffer what she had suffered.

And this…_attempt_…had felt like warning, a shadow, and a threat – to all of them. A reminder that for all the paradise they'd found, the galaxy still harbored its pits of hell.

"I don't want to lose you, Leia," Han said.

"I don't want to lose you, either," she answered. "And I don't want to die. If one of us goes, we both lose."

She went silent, her hands stilling. She looked at her palms, and then set her shoulders back and took a deep breath, lifting her head again to meet his gaze.

"I am not going in for the next couple of days," she said, and then continued: "And I think, in a month or so – I'd like Max to be walking – we should go to the chalet for a getaway. It's been so long since we've gone."

Had it been since they only had Jaina? It seemed impossible, but it also seemed to be true. Noura and Max had been so close, Han had been deployed…it was time to go back, and they needed to do it for their own good, not just in a hasty rush because they'd had a brush with death.

"S'a good idea," Han said huskily.

Leia nodded.

Han rubbed her knee.

"Can't believe the spawn slept through all of this," he muttered.

Leia very nearly threw herself down in a dramatic heap, groaning softly.

"I've been shielding myself from them," she admitted tiredly, her nose pinching. "My head is aching like you wouldn't believe."

Han touched his palm to it, his own chest aching, though it was with admiration, with pride, with sheer gratitude for the woman she was. He wished he'd been strong enough to hold it together, but hell, he knew she'd think no less of him for the sobbing. It was only that he couldn't think of anything worse than bringing all that poison up for her.

He had no anger left for her, and she had no apprehension left for him. When he reached for her, it was without the vague, haunting fear that she might inexplicably jerk away, and when she let him hold her, it was without the niggling irritation that he was suffocating her.

She was wide-awake and yet content; she had sorted herself out, and he was right, she – they – were warm again.

"Leia," he whispered reverently, yet after a moment, he lifted his head, and he touched his nose to hers, a hint of mischief in his eyes.

"Mmhm?"

"What is that safe word going to be?" he drawled quietly.

Leia drew back a little, and considered him seriously. She pursed her lips, and for a moment, she wanted to fling her arms around his neck and squeal with delight – this was right; the banter back in their lives, the pillow talk, the utter comfort and ease. She cocked an eyebrow.

"Oh," she murmured lightly. "Nerfherder?"

Han grinned, and drew his hand over her braid, touching it reverently. She pressed her palm to his chest, basking in the quiet intimacy of just being with him, of knowing they had set things right, and they hadn't lost anything. Their home was sturdy, its bones good and healthy – they were still stronger than the shadows, stronger than old ghosts, smarter than the demons with a wicked touch on a phantom trigger.

* * *

_the end_

* * *

_\- alexandra_


End file.
